(ECNS) -- The sales pitch that "Are you sure you want a tall-sized cup of Starbucks coffee?" has gone viral recently on Chinese social media Wechat after a loyal customer of the global coffee chain expressed dissatisfaction to its serving attitude online.
Lin Guotong posted on Wechat on Sunday that he was asked twice when ordering a tall-sized cup of coffee at Starbucks by a waiter: "Are you sure you want tall?" and "Tall is the smallest size here we have?"
Lin said he has been a gold membership of Starbucks since 2010 when he bought 30 cups of coffee there at a time.
"I'm a loyal customer of Starbucks, having once bought over 200 cups of coffee in one year. But still they would consistently question me about size and recommend larger options," he said.
He complained about it to Starbucks China CEO Wang Jingying that "As a gold member of Starbucks (qualified when buy 25 cups of coffee in one year) since 2012, I don't need this kind of service and don't deserve staff questioning my choice."
The message soon circulated on Wechat rapidly and caused heated discussion. The post had been read over 500,000 times with 3,000 comments till Monday night.
Netizens have different opinions. Some think that such a selling method is normal and should not anger anyone, while others have conveyed discontent over Starbucks services saying that behavior like repeatedly promoting extra products and reciting indifferent promotion lines really bore them.
Ordering tall sized coffee at Starbucks suddenly becomes popular. Some customers even intentionally go to buy tall sized coffee only to see how staff react.
The effect on social media soon aroused attention of Starbucks China. On Monday night Lin received a call as well as an email from the company, promising that they would improve their service and provide better experience to customers.
Starbucks further explained that questioning customer's choice serves only to confirm their order and means nothing more.
