Starbucks and small business

The popularly-held belief that Starbucks kills mom-and-pop shops is a fallacy, says Temple University history professor Bryant Simon.

“In fact, Starbucks created the market for the small coffee shop,” says Bryant, whose new book “Everything but the Coffee: Learning about America from Starbucks” is due to be released in October.

Simon argues that 20 years ago you couldn’t find a “good” cup of coffee anywhere, until Starbucks came along and “created a desire and a taste for specialty coffee” that eventually gave birth to the corner specialty coffee shop.

In his column for TheBigMoney.com (Frappuccinos Work for Mom and Pop), Jonathan Weber argues that the closing of a Starbucks store in Missoula, Montana is no cause for celebration by small coffee houses. “It’s dangerous to assume that what’s bad for the chains is good for the mom-and-pops,” writes Weber, who maintains the loss of jobs from the Starbucks closure will hurt local businesses. “In this economy, a store closure is nothing to cheer about.”