Cramer: Starbucks Sends The Wrong Signal

I’m done with Starbucks, at least for now. That $4.99 triple-venti-cappuccino-with-skim-wet that I had the other day will have to be my last one. That’s because the ultimate arbiter of taste, my friend Danny Meyer, who runs the best restaurant chain in New York, told me that it’s not the right moment to flaunt expensive coffee.

If you don’t know Danny, who runs Union Square Café, Tabla, Eleven Madison Park, Gramercy Tavern and Blue Smoke, then you don’t know the current national zeitgeist. Last week Danny, who wrote the bible of the hospitality industry, Setting the Table, came to Mad Money to talk about brand loyalty and customer satisfaction.

He was marveling about how great Trader Joe's is to shop at and how much fun it is to go to a Costco (Stock Quote: COST) or a Chipotle (Stock Quote: CMG). Danny’s got a great eye for stores and for product so I asked him about Starbucks (Stock Quote: SBUX). I wanted to know if there could be a turn in the fortunes of the company.

No, he said. Not any time soon.

This is a moment in time where people want to play it cool. They don’t want to be seen as big spenders. The $4.99 Starbucks latte has become our everyday corporate jet! Danny says people “feel bad” about spending that kind of money and they feel that their coworkers are eying them as seekers of the extravagant, especially given that Dunkin Donuts and McDonald’s (Stock Quote: MCD) serves a good cup of java for half the price.