National Coffee Break – Free Cup of Coffee at Starbucks – Today Only

Today, (Tuesday, March 15th, 2006) from 10am until noon Starbucks will be giving away free cups of coffee in a promotion they’re calling the “National Coffee Break.” They are estimating they’ll be giving away more than 500,000 12 once cups of coffee in the event. They’ll also have ‘Ventri Vans’ roaming around towns delivering hot coffee to those who can’t make it into a local store.

All the news sites are ‘buzzing’ with this news, but I couldn’t find a single mention of this on the Starbucks website.

This announcement comes after McDonald’s recently introduced gourmet coffee in their stores and Dunkin Donuts continues to grow. In Boston Dunkin Donuts is reportedly sending out pink taxicabs around the city to offer free rides and a sample of its “Turbo Hot” coffee that has a shot of real espresso.

While this will probably be a good promotion for Starbucks, I imagine the United States economy will come to a grinding halt for most of the day as employees in all the US timezones rush away from their jobs to get a free cup of coffee. We’re not only a nation of coffee lovers, we’re a nation of coffee lovers who can’t resist anything free.