CONFESSIONS

CONFESSIONS OF A MILK THIEF

What’s wrong with 7-11′s coffee bar?

I have a confession to make.

I’m a milk thief. That’s right, today I stole milk from my local 7-11… and four other times in the past couple weeks.

See, recently, I’ve really grown an affinity for 7-11′s coffee experience. It’s not just the brew options or the fact that I’ve grown a bit sick of Starbucks. I also like:

• The array of fresh pots (in the morning – can’t speak for evening freshness)
• The individual (real) sugar packets, so you know exactly how many sugars you are using
• The empowerment and ritual of self-service – there’s just something about pouring your own cup of fresh, hot coffee
• The slew of optional flavors in the form of creamers and syrups
• The range of cup options and designs (I particularly like the self-insulated ‘Cup with a Cause‘ cup)
• The well designed and functional WAKE UP protector sleeve thingies (should you choose not to buy the self-insulated ‘Cup for a Cause’ – asshole)
• And the price, c’mon

Yeah. I really, really like 7-11 coffee. But, even with all the awesome features I mentioned above, there is one major component missing to complete a truly great cup of coffee. That’s right, milk. 7-11 does NOT offer milk at their coffee bars.

So what did I do about it?

I’ll admit, the first trip I made to 7-11 for coffee a couple weeks back, I settled for the creamer.

Problem a.) If you are buying a very large cup of coffee you need about 7 creamers to make it work – if you are me

Problem b.) Creamer is not milk

So, the next visit to 7-11 for a delicious cup of coffee I took matters into my own hands and got a little vigilant. When I walked into the store I made a B-line to the drink cooler, grabbed a pint of milk and toted it over to the coffee bar. Then, I poured my coffee, opened the milk, poured in a splash, replaced the top and slid the rest of the milk over by the creamer caddy. You know, so others could also use some tasty milk if they wanted. Plus, In this economy, who wants to buy a whole pint of milk if they only need a splash?

This quickly became habit. I used the same technique 3 or 4 more times and it worked. Until it all came to a crashing halt today.

Yes. I got caught.

I went through my normal process (this time it was even more thrilling because there was a cop inside), got the milk, poured my coffee, poured the milk, left the milk for others to enjoy and walked to the register to pay. Just as I was paying for my hot, delicious, milked coffee the store manager walked up and told me that I had to pay for the milk. He also told me that he had seen me do the same thing 5 times. Dude was pissed. He also instructed me that I would need to buy my coffee elsewhere from now on. That’s right.

And I was banned from my local 7-11 – just for being the neighborhood Milken Hood for the past couple weeks. Gah.

I made good and voluntarily (if that counts for anything) paid my restitution for today’s pint and the previous 4. But, I am still left with an empty feeling about this whole situation.

This is What needs to happen:

If 7-11 wants to compete with the major players in the coffee business they are going to have to step their game up and start offering milk at their coffee bars. As I’ve already stated, everything else is amazing!

7-11 needs FREE milk at their coffee bars. This isn’t just for the people. This offering will transcend the 7-11 coffee experience past the “convenient store coffee” genre and into the upper echelon of coffee shop experiences. I mean, you can’t get Skittles or anything with your coffee at Starbucks can you?

But, You can at a local 7-11!