Open letter to the head of Loyalty and/or Customer Experience at Starbucks:

Hi there,

You don’t know me by name, but I’m a “heavy user” of Starbucks. Since 2004, I have gone to Starbucks >5 days a week. And with very high frequency, I buy 7 days a week and more than 1x per day.

I’m part of your most profitable segment of customers – the ones who buy everything at starbucks – handcrafted drink, pastry or breakfast sandwich, bottle of water and sometimes lunch when traveling – and I bring friends and family with me to ensure I get my fix.

Yet I don’t get very special treatment. I was excited back in 2008 when you introduced the Gold card. Flashing this super ostentatious card would be sure to get me special treatment, right? Well, no, turns out millions of people have Gold status. All it takes is 30 drinks in a calendar year to earn Gold. I often earn that in a month!

Can you please introduce another tier of loyalty?! Yes, the free drinks every 15 stars are nice, but I’d actually rather have more personalized treatment and faster service instead of free things. Living in NYC, I often spend 10-15 minutes getting my Starbucks fix every morning. And when the Baristas mess up my drink and act like they’ve never seen me before, it makes me wonder why I keep coming back.

My dream perk: I would love the Starbucks app to allow “pre-ordering” and “skip the line” functionality. I want to open the app, click “order the usual” and walk straight to the barista to pick up my drink. Years ago, I had a barista who used to see me enter the store and expedite my drink. I miss that!

Your frustrated but frequent chai tea drinker,

Alex