Starbucks Employees Can't Stand How Strict This Rule Is

If you regularly stop by Starbucks for your morning coffee, you're probably unaware of the strict rules baristas behind the bar must comply with. From banning pens in pockets to micromanaging the color of the shirts they wear, these arbitrary rules have gotten downright ridiculous. However, there's one rule that drives most employees crazy, and that's writing on every single cup. It's not exactly new — writing on cups has been around for years, but employees say it's being pushed again under CEO Brian Niccol's "Back to Basics" strategy. And it's not just that they have to handwrite a message on the cups — the rules behind what they can write vary wildly between stores.

In some locations, it's fine to write things like "enjoy" on every cup and call it a day. In others, though, higher-ups can be strict about these trite messages. "GM and DM have been getting onto us for writing the same thing on every cup. Literally just inventing new rules every week," vents one employee on Reddit. And the type of content they write on the cups is under severe scrutiny, too. "Our DM banned smiley faces and stars on cups. If we write 'thank you,' it has to be 'thank you, [customer name],'" complains another employee about the level of micromanaging they have to deal with.

One content restriction that's more widespread is pop culture references, which can be too niche and easily misinterpreted. In one instance, before the rule was widely enforced, a cup message reading "slay queen" was taken as a direct threat by a customer. In another case, a customer complained that an employee was "terrorizing customers" by writing "shmingus" on their cup. Essentially, employees seem to be walking a tightrope between creating a personal message for every cup while not offending anyone. All signs point to Starbucks' big revamp backfiring in a major way.

Starbucks employees are over the soul-crushing mandate to write on cups and make each message inspiring and just the right length. Starbucks employees aren't even allowed to draw cute animals on cups, and flex their creative muscles with doodles. "At this point, since they are mandating writing on cups, they need to just have a list of exact words and phrases that are allowed or start printing cups with 'writing' on them," complains one employee on Reddit. Employees now operate on a heightened level of fear, where forgetting to write on cups or not adhering to other policies could get them fired without warning. As one commenter jokingly put it on Reddit, "it writes on the cups or else it gets the hose again."

Worst of all? Many customers don't even notice or care about these notes. "I just realized I've never even noticed anything written on my cup. I don't even look," states one Redditor. A few other commenters complained that the black-ink message gets on their fingers and is a pain to remove. Many customers say they'd prefer the policy be scrapped if it meant faster service — not to mention the pressure to make each note personal has backfired and made them feel insincere. Regardless of the policy, Starbucks still has a chokehold on America, despite the fact that Starbucks baristas aren't writing messages on cups by choice.