The language of brand

If a website can be a unicorn . . . why can't a duck?!

A professor of English has been in the news today because she was thrown out of a New York branch of Starbucks for refusing to use the chain’s choice of phrasing.

Apparently she was ordering a plain multi-grain bagel, and the barista wouldn’t serve her unless she used the phrase “without butter and cheese”.

Now, during my long and distinguished career serving coffee (part-time when I was at school), I’ve never told a customer they can’t make an order unless they use the designated word combination as authorised by the company.

Starbucks are pretty smart by controlling the words and phrases used in their shops, by using terms like ‘grande’ instead of ‘large’ they’ve altered the vocabulary to give them a more continental and classy feel. Changing the phrases gives them control and branding beyond the products and into the actual process of ordering itself.

However, you get to a point where your carefully crafted vocab ends up being a barrier to effective communication. If staff only speak Starbucks, and can’t translate ‘large’ into ‘grande’ then you’re in trouble.

Personally I think I’m going to start calling Edge of the Web designed sites ‘unicorns’. We’d be the only unicorn designers in the world – even gods can’t lay claim to that one!

Business unicorns ready in 1 day. It’s catchy, but something tells me we won’t get much business if we insist all our customers ask us for unicorns!