n a unique arrangement that could provide a working model for its stores nationwide, Starbucks coffee has paired with Music City Pawn to open a combination coffeeshop/pawnshop on Gallatin Road.
“Our research shows that a lot of people who would enjoy our coffee frankly can’t afford it without a little financial help,” says Starbucks spokesperson Raine Simpson from the company’s headquarters in Seattle. “In the Pacific Northwest, we have experimented with having local banks provide loan officers inside our locations, but this pawnshop arrangement is a first for us.”
Music City Pawn owner Bud Sandage calls it a “win-win” situation. “This is bringing us a whole new type of customer,” he says. “This is a marriage of two quality and well-respected brand names.”
In a flyer being distributed in the Starbucks/Music City Pawn location, customers are urged to “Bring in unwanted household items, including appliances, personal items, and firearms, and get a loan for a steaming cup of latté or café au lait.” It was an enticement that self-described “East Nashville hipster” Sid Bloviate couldn’t resist. “I brought in some gardening tools that I found lying around the basement, and got almost enough to afford two cups of coffee,” he says, luxuriously inhaling steam from the paper cup on the table in front of him. “There might even be enough stuff in my garage for me to buy one of those metallic travel mugs.”
Some community activists have expressed concern that linking the easy sale of used goods and the use of an addictive substance could lead to an increase in crime in the neighborhoods around the coffeeshop/pawnshop. “We don’t need desperate, headachey caffeine addicts turned loose on our streets with easy access to a place to sell their loot,” says East Nashville activist Mac Bussard.
Starbucks’ spokesperson Simpson rejects such a criticism. “This isn’t crack cocaine, it’s coffee,” she says. “It just happens to be very premium coffee that some people might need to pawn some stuff to buy.”
