ArabBucks

There are nine Starbucks coffee shops in Doha, and surprisingly enough there are two that are located in the same mall, City Center, one on each floor. Every mall in Doha has a Starbucks and there will probably be a Starbucks (or two) located in the malls that are going to be built in the future. Starbucks has a unique marketing strategy that relies mostly on word of mouth and social media, as you can rarely find a Starbucks ad on television. Starbucks came to the Middle East as a result of globalization. Globalization is the flow of goods, services, money, people, information and culture across political boarders.

There are five major things that are associated with Globalization; Multi-national corporations, the ideology of capitalism, governments, resistance and consequences. The multi-national corporations benefiting from Starbucks in the Middle East are, the actual franchise itself, the companies that provide the kitchen appliances, people who charge them for using the space, and furniture stores. The ideology of capitalism works on increasing profit year after year, and Starbucks achieves that by opening a new market, mostly in malls, every year. Since there is large mall culture in Doha, opening a new Starbucks in every mall built is quite strategic. There are going a lot of new malls in Doha in the next few years, so Starbucks will have many options to start a new market. The government that gives the franchise the license gets part of the profit. There could be resistance from local coffee shops, especially if a Starbucks opened next to a Karak shop, and from people who are against having western companies in Doha. The consequences are, the flow of money outside the country, loss of traditional culture and labor, as the employees get a low salary.

Some products in the coffee shop are glocalized to attract more Arabs. Glocalization occurs when a product is reconfigured to adhere to the local customs. An example of that is the new “Mediterranean” roasted vegetables brown sub or the new “Arabian” halloumi ciabatta.

There were ads on the table for both sandwiches, and they both had “Simply Delicious… Made for you” written on them. “Made for you” written in a white obvious font to show that Starbucks respects the Middle Eastern culture and included food on the menu that is just for Middle easterners. In the shelves that contained products on sale, there were mugs and a large selection of coffee packets. The mugs had Qatar written on them along with a drawing of the Oryx. All the coffee packets had the words 100% Arabica coffee written on the bottom left corner.