Thanks to Pepper.ph for alerting us that OMG, Starbucks is actually opening its second Starbucks Reserve outlet in Manila tomorrow. “Its second location in Burgos Circle, Fort Bonifacio, is set to open its doors to the public tomorrow, May 13,” writes Mikka Wee on the popular food website. Apparently, the first Starbucks Reserve, in Tomas Morato Quezon City, has been operational since May 2.
But you and us both got lost along the way: What is Starbucks Reserve?!
We think it’s a reaction to the growing Third Wave Coffee movement that the city is experiencing—you know, the rise of those terribly earnest speciality coffee shops preparing coffee in a rather complicated but totally worth it manner.
According to the Starbucks Philippines Facebook page, Starbucks Reserve is a “new and elevated coffee experience for our customers. Starting from the beans, to the way we prepare our coffee, to the environment in which our customers will experience it.” These are “stores that are designed to showcase the exotic, rare, and exquisite Starbucks Reserve Coffee.”
If you’re stuck, asking what the hell is Third Wave Coffee, short of the long: Coffee coñosseurs, enthusiasts, and the like believe coffee has evolved in three waves. The first being its discovery. The second, when it was sold as a commodity, and the third, which is right now, when coffee is looked at, understood, and enjoyed in a more artful and passionate manner. Starbucks, along with the big coffee brands that you can spurt out off the top of your head (what is Nescafe), belong to the second wave.
“Are the business models of the bigger and more mainstream coffee joints threatened?” Asks Pepper.ph.
Maybe, who knows. But now is certainly the time for them to guzzle up on their beans and get their thinking caps on.
Starbucks Reservce (G/F Eight Forbestown, Burgos Circle, BGC, Taguig) opens tomorrow.
