Summary
A California jury awarded Michael Garcia $50 million after he suffered severe burns from a spilled Starbucks hot tea, requiring skin grafts and causing permanent disfigurement.
Garcia’s lawsuit alleged a Starbucks employee failed to secure the drink in a tray, leading to the spill. Starbucks offered a $30 million settlement with confidentiality, which Garcia rejected.
The company plans to appeal, calling the damages excessive.
The case echoes past lawsuits over hot beverage burns, including the famous McDonald’s coffee case from the 1990s.
You make it sound like those poor people at Starbucks have no choice but to please the masses, even at the cost of going bankrupt. I think this is just a boundary of their business model. But maybe bending over and passing a flimsy paper cup full of boiling water through a small window directly above someone’s dick is just not a great way to make money, and it was a matter of time until it was litigated away from the market. Maybe another chain can find a safe way to do this and drive starbucks out of business, you know, innovate. Coldbrew tea, better cup, a tray with a stable center of mass, fill your own cup, whatever.
I think maybe you could consider putting this into perspective. One accident among tens of millions of cups of coffee and tea served really isn’t cause for pitchforks and reforms, it’s just life, and unfortunate accidents happen. I hope the guy in the car recovers.
At the end of the day, whether it was the guy tilting the carrier, or the barista not seating the cup, it was an hourly employee behind the window being a human, not the CEO.