I finally sat down and told the long-awaited story of why I quit working at Starbucks—because this specific store was toxic as hell. Like, overall Starbucks can be a good place to work (tuition reimbursement, benefits, free drinks, partner discount), and I genuinely thought it would be fun because I was a customer there all the time. I wasn’t even doing it for the money—I already had a marketing job—but once I started training, reality hit fast: minimum wage, cleaning the nastiest public washrooms, getting burned by steamers and hell-temperature hot water, and dealing with customers who think a Starbucks barista is their personal servant. Then there’s the real reason I dipped: the staff. The manager was fine, but the store culture was weird and cliquey, and there were a couple supervisors who made every shift miserable. One guy (my “Jacob”) was nice as a customer but turned into a control-freak at work—especially toward girls—constantly grabbing tasks, barking orders, and acting like he owned the place. His girlfriend coworker was even worse, hovering and nitpicking everything, plus being weirdly possessive and dramatic. After less than a year, I was like… I’m not doing this for minimum wage. So I cut my shifts down, they weren’t having it, and I was like okay—peace.