Why America’s Two Greatest Fast Food Restaurants are more similar than we think…and why we don’t think they are
Starbucks and Taco Bell represent America like no other two fast food entities. They are the living aspirations of every Hardy’s and Carl’s Jr. and Wendy’s across America.
This is because they do one thing uniquely better than anyone (besides each other) and that one unique thing is uniquely American.
They synthesize foodstuffs.
Can you find a more Corporate America way to say that no other fast food restaurants come up with crazier amalgamations of their core product better than Starbucks and Taco Bell. Their successes change our language. How many people would know what a Frappuccino is without Starbucks?
From the Atlantic’s 2014 article, bolding my own:
Taco Bell invited a group of snack manufacturers to its California headquarters in 2009 for an “ideation session.” Market research had shown that Millennials wanted food to deliver an experience, not just energy, and the company was searching for an innovation their customer base would talk about with friends.
Listen to how hard Hardee’s tries to find their signature Frankenfood, aiming for the glory that is the pinnacle of Frankenfood, (and the topic of the Atlantic article above) Taco Bell’s Doritos Locos Taco.
These monsters that Taco Bell and Starbucks create are the Jerry Springer’s of food, or for a more contemporary reference, they’re the How Far is Tattoo Far? of food. Like reality television, the foodstuffs developed by Taco Bell and Starbucks represent the inevitable outcome of capitalism: the steeply monetized guilty pleasure.
Two Opposing Stars Revolving Around Eachother
Taco Bell and Starbucks are the inverse of each other, and like many inverses they are, in many ways, the same.
One picks up where the other leaves off (early morning vs. late night), they fold in on each other like two revolving stars, collapsing all of America into their drive-thrus.
What Taco Bell does for savory, cheesy foodstuffs, Starbucks does the exact same for caffeinated, sugary liquidstuffs.
The catch?
People don’t associate the two with each other as much as they should. And I’m fairly certain no Starbucks regulars think of themselves in the same group as Taco Bell devotees.
So let’s look at some reasons why they are.
1. We revel in the trashiness of Taco Bell creations, and gloss over Starbucks nutrition facts.
As I type this I am in a Starbucks.
I look forward to the crazy shit on their menu with each changing season.
And this season has just brought, in Starbucks’ words, our “favorites” back. That means, right now, I am drinking the insane Caramel Ribbon Crunch Frappuccino.
This fructose goblin has 490 calories, 68 grams of sugar and 65% of all the saturated fat you’re supposed to have in a day.
Let’s compare that to my favorite Taco Bell menu item: the Cheesy Gordita Crunch.
I searched the loneliest website in America, the Taco Bell Nutrition Info page, to find that this humble taco sandwich has 500 calories, only 10 more than the espresso monster I just finished.
Not only that, this entire taco has 10g of Saturated Fat, as opposed to the “Gr Crml Crnch Frap” (as it’s written on my cup) which has 13.
Sure, the Gordita Crunch has more calories from fat than my coffee thing, but it’s FOOD. My Starbucks is a BEVERAGE. It’s hard to imagine a drink with more fat being able to be sucked through a straw. Not only is it hard to imagine, but disgusting as well.
2. The Aspiring Bourgeoisie vs the Resigned Lower Class
Starbucks makes insane-combos-that-make-you-poop, for the middle class to feel like they’re holding a little piece of the upper class in their hands while they stalk around Homegoods on a Saturday.
Taco Bell makes insane-combos-that-make-you-poop, for people who have given up on the day by noon and decide to get Taco Bell for lunch. Or stoners in college who should already be in bed but are definitely skipping their 9:45am class for the redundant joy of smoke cruising at midnight. But most importantly, Taco Bell provides tasty food for people who can’t afford to eat out elsewhere.
Starbucks represents the aspirations of an America that still feels like it can get somewhere. Taco Bell is for those who know the game is rigged against them. Or, simply want to buy 16 foods for $20.
But make no mistake, they are the same thing. They are both the foodie fever dreams of our collective subconscious.
3. Graphic Design
In what is the most forgivable aspect of our collective misunderstanding, a lot of the reason we think about these companies the way we do is because of what they look like.
Starbucks up-scales itself with its graphic design. Taco Bell has a different goal.
Despite the nauseating “so. much. yes.”, note how the typeface is a business-casual-retirement-party of a font.
The green in Starbucks logo is bordering on earth tone.
And notice the interior, which blends the aspiring upper-middle class dreams of its font, with the big-corporation-but-wants-to-seem-down-to-earth-and-inviting-greens of its logo (“big corporation but wants to seem down to earth and inviting green” consider yourself trademarked.)
As I mentioned, Taco Bell has different goals.
The logo above and the ad below are more about punching you in the face with color until you EAT SOME TACOS.
Self-Knowledge vs Self-Deception
What I enjoy about Taco Bell is that it knows who it is. It is not selling an image of elevated status via purchase.
Though, while that may sadly be changing as it looks like Taco Bell may be testing upscale interiors, let’s take this moment in time to commend Taco Bell on what it’s done so far: stayed true to itself.
Taco Bell is like the old friend who owns his jnco ownership, who still wears a chain wallet, who never grew out of ska. Life needs those people carrying on their very particular torch.
I have no qualms with Starbucks, that I know of. I hope my paragraphs on the topic of a single frappuccino flavor convinced you of that.
My problem is with the way we as a culture see these fast food chains.
That we inherently regard Starbucks drinkers as more affluent, more healthy, even more enlightened, than 1) they are and, than 2) Taco Bell eaters.
You can walk around any mall with a Star-B in your hand and people will just start handing you their credit cards and their children. But walk around a single Target eating a chalupa and everyone starts throwing their garbage at you.
Get Off Your Caffeinated-High Horse Starbucks
Starbucks, your mocha-choca-latte-ya-ya is no more high-end than Taco Hell’s bag of mini-Cinnabon balls (which I’m surprised are not a Schedule 2 drug because they are cocaine).
And while I greatly enjoy feeling productive as I drink a milkshake worth of sugar and have a nice little Saturday at Home Depot, lately I’ve found that thinking of Starbucks as this experimental laboratory of Frankfen-drink creations is actually a fun way to subvert their current label as the Queen-of-all-Basic coffee shops.
Trying out the craziest thing they’ve come up with every time you go is a much different experience than ordering the same Iced Vanilla Latte every time. I know, I’m guilty of both.
So while I ask Starbucks to take a self-appointed step down from its thrown of beans, and embrace its human-like, rebellious side, I know it never will. Or rather, we won’t let it.
Why We Will Never Let Starbucks Off its Caffeinated-High Horse
So why won’t we let Starbucks off its pillar?
To the point where some people are probably disputing my categorization of it as a “fast food restaurant”?
Because we would never do that to caffeine.
Everyday, Everyday Americans burn themselves out to be productive. Caffeine is the only thing that allows us to do this, to care about that excel spreadsheet, to respond to that email, to pick up another hammer and another nail.
We will never turn on you Starbucks.
You save us from admitting we are no better than, gasp, energy drink drinkers.
We will never turn on you because we can never lower caffeine from its esteemed pillar. To do so would undermine one of our nation’s most ardently held virtues (and myths): that hard work is a virtue in and of itself.
We love to eat, but at least we have some shame about that.
There is no shame in our love of caffeine.
No one afraid to show up at work with a bigger coffee than everyone else. No mid-level manager embarrassed to be seen going back for another refill. No cubicle comic asking people to talk to them before they have their coffee.
For that reason, I have no fear that we will lower Starbucks from its reserved status as “drug dealer of all drug dealers”.
I also do not fear we will elevate Taco Bell, as it is today, to a caffeine-level altar. That is unless of course Taco Bell, say, went with some safer graphic design, and maybe fancied up their stores, maybe made all their customers stand in line while their employees assembly-lined our food bowls and told us it’s fun to customize things this way while hiding the fact that they are taking all the thinking out of their workers jobs.
No, if we did that we might become a nation of, shutter, Chipotle’s.