I was running errands in that “taking it easy week” between Christmas and New Year’s Day. I grossly overestimated the travel time to get to my last stop. So, I had time to kill. I figured I would get a cup of coffee someplace and focus a bit on the “taking it easy” part of the holiday season.
When I think about getting a cuppa when I am out and about, it means that I am looking for a Starbucks that conveniently dot the landscapes in my stomping grounds. On my route to that last stop, I came upon a Dunkin’ that I used by every morning in 2013 on my way to a small manufacturing client I worked with during brief consulting career.
For nostalgia’s sake, I thought I would stop there. Of course, being a Dunkin’, I knew the experience would not be much on the nostalgic side. Dunkin’s have a certain lame sameness to their design. Proletariat sameness seems to be more a part of their corporate mission than nostalgia. There is nothing wrong with that.
As I approached the door of the shop, I noticed a big poster in the window. It offered a medium size of their DD Holiday Blend for $2. It included some blah-blah about their holiday blend having “sweet notes of molasses and dried fruit.” The fact that in emphasized the flavor of the holiday blend in Spanish and in the process teaching me that melaza is Spanish for molasses, sold me on this special offer.
I ordered a medium holiday blend. The pleasant young lady, who I was certain knew what melaza meant well before the aforementioned poster was placed in the window, punched a few keys on a modern flatscreen evolution of a cash register. She said, “$3.69.” Even though Illinois and Cook County are amongst the highest sales tax locales in the country, my razor sharp economic mind surmised that $1.69 was a bit excess for tax on a $2 item. So, I said something clever like, “Wow, how much tax is there on a $2 item.” No doubt because of the KN95 mask I was wearing, the young Dunkin’ista missed my playful sarcasm and concisely replied with “What?”
I told her about the giant poster in their window which clearly offered a medium holiday blend with sweet notes of molasses and dried fruit for $2. Again, her response was, “What? Which poster?” I pointed to the window where the poster was. But from the inside of the store, the poster was just blank white. From the equally blank look on her face, I offered to wait while she walked outside to look at the important side of the poster. She did not take me up on that offer but rather stared at her flat screen panel cash register. I could see from her eyes, as she was masked as well, that the staring did nothing to provide any more insight to our wee pricing conundrum.
She walked away to consult with two of her senior associates. They were young men that were probably 3 to 6 months older than her 19 or 20 years on the planet. They whispered in Spanish to each other. One of the men asked me “Which sign?” and I dutifully pointed at the same poster and made him the same offering of my willingness to wait while he went outside to take a gander at the offer that was seemingly quite confusing to all of us.
While they were deliberating further, I told them, “I am not upset, but simply reacting to a sign in your window.” One of the fellows said, “We don’t put the signs in the window. And, that special is done.” Not wanting to cause more confusion, I said, “No worries. Just give me a small holiday blend.” After a short but awkward period of blank looks, the young lady took 3 $1 bills from me, returned $.47 in change to me. I put the $.47 into their tip jar along with another dollar for all the trouble I inadvertently caused. She then proceeded to the coffee urns where instead of just pouring me a small cup, she started the process of making a new batch… of what I presumed was the holiday blend. Before she got very far, “No need to make a new batch. Just give me whatever is ready to go.” She said, “Yeah, we don’t really sell the holiday blend anymore,” and poured me a small cup of their original blend.
As I left, I thanked and three of them for their help, re-emphasized that I was not upset (since I knew this would become a blog post), and wished them and families a happy New Year. I got back to my car, I put the coffee in the cup holder, and walked back to the store to take a photo of the poster for this very blog. I was now smiling, unmasked, as I walked back toward to poster and saw that the two fellows had pulled the poster back to see if I was telling the truth. At my urging, they lowered the poster so I could get a photo.
I got my bloggy bit out of the experience but will have to wait until next year to see if the holiday blend has the “sweet notes of molasses and dried fruit,” assuming they don’t change the blend.
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