Ever wonder why your Starbucks drink isn’t filled all the way to the top? Two California residents feel your pain, and have filed a lawsuit seeking compensation for their lost coffee.
Siera Strumlauf of San Francisco and Benjamin Robles of San Diego are named as the plaintiffs in a class-action lawsuit that claims Starbucks habitually underfills their lattes by “25 percent,” cheating consumers out of millions of dollars annually.
The lawsuit, first shared by BuzzFeed news, claims that Starbucks’ latte recipe calls for less milk than is needed to fill their cups. The Starbucks latte recipes calls for baristas to fill a pitcher of milk to a “pour-to” line before steaming it, a line which the lawsuit claims is “simply too small to accommodate the fluid ounces” in tall, grande and vente drinks.
The suit also claims that Starbucks for lattes are filled to “¼ inch below the rim” in a Grande Latte cup — 25% below capacity.
The lawsuit also states that both plaintiffs paid nearly $4 for Grande-sized lattes, and found their cups to not be filled all the way. Both Stumlauf and Robles claim they relied on Starbucks’ menu when making their order and that they would not have ordered their drinks if they knew they would not receive a 16-oz latte.
“We are proud to serve our customers high-quality, handcrafted and customized beverages, and we inform customers of the likelihood of variations,” Starbucks said in a statement to BuzzFeed.
The full lawsuit can be read below.
Alex Hider is a writer for the E.W. Scripps National Desk. Follow him on Twitter @alexhider.
