Whoops. A Hong Kong Starbucks made one customer unhappy after totally screwing up a first name. Imagine that! A Starbucks spelling fail? Impossible.
On the Hong Kong Starbucks' Facebook page (via HongWrong), a customer posted an image of the fail, writing:
This is my sister's cuppa [SIC] from your HKU branch. Fancy your staff not being able to spell an American name like Virginia. Forgiving she has been with every misspelled cup. Her cup was once 'Virgin'. Every Starbucks experience for her has been coupled with fear and anticipation. But THIS is just UNACCEPTABLE. Starbucks HK, you have to buck up or just not spell your customer's name anyway. It is a derogatory attitude even if it is unintentional. What do you have to say about this?
On Facebook, the comment has been liked over a thousand times. Some are calling the photo a fake, while others think it's unfair to expect Hong Kong's non-American staff to be able to spell American names. Starbucks is a global corporation!
If real, I doubt this was done to be mean. Well, I sure hope it wasn't.
This isn't the first "Vagina" Starbucks spell fail—heck, there's even a whole Tumblr of assorted name fails. It is the first fail I can recall that has made a customer angry enough to turn the situation into some sort of vaguely international issue.
While it's unfortunate that the customer had such an unpleasant experience, I think the one takeaway is that even though going to Starbucks filled her sister with "fear and anticipation", she continued to patron Starbucks. Is the coffee is that good?
In case you missed it, here is Kotaku's round up of cool and interesting looking Starbucks across Asia.
This is my sister's cuppa from your HKU branch [Facebook via HongWrong]
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