Jacob Grier is a libertarian who loves coffee. So how does he feel about Starbucks?

Let’s begin with the easy issue: Starbucks is driving independent coffee shops out of business. Anecdotally, this may seem obviously true. Many people can name a favorite coffee shop that went out of business soon after a Starbucks moved into the neighborhood. The fact is, though, that Starbucks is creating a market, not destroying it. Growth in both independent and corporate coffee shops has been huge over the past fifteen years, thanks in large part to consumers being introduced to specialty coffee drinks in the safe confines of their local Starbucks.

The Specialty Coffee Association of America, a leading trade group, tracks American retail sales. In 1989, the SCAA estimates there were 585 coffee houses operating in the U.S. By 1995 that number had risen to 5,000. By 2003, there were 17,400 shops in operation.

Starbucks growth is notable, but it’s far from the sole factor driving these new shop openings. The SCAA reports that 57% of the shops open in 2003 were independent, having only one to three locations. Microchains (4-9 units) made up another 3% of the market. All the large chains combined make up the remaining 40%. [Source .pdf]

A 2004 article in the Willamette Weekly finds a similar pattern at work in Portland. In 2003, a misguided miscreant attempted to blow up a new Starbucks in a neighborhood where residents claimed to not want the imperial corporate giant. But a survey of the local yellow pages reveals that indie shops were doing just fine in Portland:

According to the Portland Yellow Pages, before Starbucks came to Portland in 1989, there were 28 coffee shops in the city. Today, there are 91 non-Starbucks coffeehouses in Portland proper, compared with the chain’s 48 stores within city limits.

Grier also identifies a coming “third wave” to revolutionize the merchandizing of coffee, much in the same way that Starbucks precipitated the “second wave”:

In the third wave, the goal is to complete the evolution of coffee from commodity to connoisseur beverage. In essence, specialty coffee needs to become more like wine. You wouldn’t buy a bottle of wine labeled solely by country of origin and with no vintage date, yet people buy coffee like this all the time. Changing this means using detailed labeling, not just by country but by the specific grower or even the individual lot of beans. It means putting the roast date on every bag, ensuring freshness. And it means investing in the equipment and the training necessary to make sure that the best qualities of each coffee are brought out when it is finally served to the customer, or else the rest is all for naught.

Starbucks is clearly not a part of this third wave, but so what? For there is no third wave without a second to precede it. Even now, while Starbucks can’t deliver the quality I’d like on the scale on which it operates, I’m glad to see one of its kiosks when I walk into an airport lobby for an early morning flight. I can get better coffee in the airport now than I could a decade ago. The same could be said for almost any other spot in America, thanks either directly to Starbucks or to the smaller shops filling in the market it helped create.

I’ve written about my own Starbucks experience before, although it didn’t have much to do with the quality of the coffee.