I applied online and chose 4 local locations where I would be available to work. The next day I was called for an interview by an area manager and we set up an interview for the following day. Before we hung up he asked me "why do you want to work at Starbucks?" Upon arrival I told the baristas that I had an interview with the manager and they offered me a free drink. I declined because I think it would be rude and unprofessional to drink coffee during an interview (not to mention I already had coffee that day). They told me they'd tell the manager I had arrived and I took a seat. My perception of the baristas working at that location was that they were too busy with their personal conversations to greet me promptly and I had to stand there and wait for them to finish talking. After about 10 minutes a group of two managers were wrapping up another interview and then approached me. We greeted each other (although I didn't expect there to be two managers) and they invited me to interview in the outdoor seating area. I offered them my resume and they took it. They seemed to have a lot of worries about me going into my field of academic study for a job rather than staying with Starbucks. Questions asked included: Why Starbucks? What makes you a better canidate than other applicants? Tell us about a time there was ambiguity in a workplace situation and how did you handle it? What do you think about friendships at work? Do you have plans for any time off? How long do you see yourself staying at Starbucks/What do you see for your future career? How do you handle multi-tasking? How do you deliver high level customer service when it's busy? How do you build rapport with customers? What are your greatest strengths and weaknesses? We wrapped up the inteview with me asking some questions (what is a typical day for a barista, what is the training you provide) and they said I'd hear from them by the following Friday. I never got a call or heard anything back. I purposefully didn't follow up because it doesn't seem like the right culture for me. My perception of Starbucks was that they want you to make at least a one-year committment to barista-ing and expect you to deliver high level customer service combined with sales. They said you could be taught to be a barista and lack of experience isn't a problem but you need to have a natural ability to connect with people. It seems that you must be an outgoing, perky, "yes" person to work in this position. Overall, the managers were in their mid-twenties and still acted like they were part of a fraternity or sorority. Even worse is that their customers seem to be part of this frat-boy club too.