Dear Mr. Pace
My name is Dasha Levin, and I am a freshman at Chapman University. I am writing to you today about an event that occurred a week ago, which involved your product: Jamba Juice. I have been a Jamba Juice enthusiast for my entire life. I have memories of going to Jamba with my mom and brother after school for as long as I can remember. Although my tastes have changed, as I used to be more of a Strawberry Whirl kind of kid, and have now grown into a Matcha Green Tea Blast young adult, my loyalty to your smoothies has not wavered.
Imagine my happiness when I discovered that there was a Jamba Juice located on my college campus! Never before had I had the ability to walk from class and get my daily dose of happiness in a cup.
On Wednesday, February 26, 2020, I had a particularly stressful morning. My 8 A.M. class did not go well, and I left it feeling tired, distraught, and hungry. I knew that my beloved Jamba would be the perfect pick-me-up for this cloudy winter day, so off I went to order a large Matcha Green Tea Blast. I knew that 28 liquid ounces of pure gold would perfectly hit the spot. Not wanting to waste a single drop of deliciousness on my walk back, I resisted the urge to take a sip as I made my way back to my dorm. It was then that the tragedy occurred. One minute I was walking along, happily anticipating my beverage, and the next thing I knew, like a slow-motion scene in a movie, the drink was slipping through my hand, flying through the air, and exploding all over the sidewalk in front of me. My left hand contained my textbook from class, so there was no saving my smoothie from its fate as it covered the sidewalk, my pants, hoodie, and face in green liquid.
For a moment I stood, trying to process what had happened. As I blinked green, sticky mess from my eyes, I was able to focus on a girl standing ten feet away from me. Before I could even collect myself or allow the disappointment to sink in, she called out to me, and said, “everything is going to be okay.” She kept walking, continuing on her day, and I watched her leave. Once I collected myself and kept walking to my dorm, her words echoed in my head, and made me angrier and angrier. To her, it was simply a funny and unfortunate story: boy walks past her, boy drops drink, boy is covered in drink. To me, this smoothie was a symbol of turning a frustrating morning into a happy one, as the item I purchased to bring me joy became a literal disaster that had to be cleaned up. For the rest of the day, as I passed by the spot where the incident occurred, I felt ashamed, and was reminded all over again how my morning joy turned into embarrassment.
Unlike the pain of a papercut, the pain of spilling my matcha green tea blast has lasted for weeks. It rattled me to the point where I haven’t been able to return to my favorite smoothie place. I was so incensed by this tragedy that I was spurred to write a letter to the CEO of Jamba Juice as a result. I know I am not the only one to have this issue so I feel the need to speak out and stand up for those who feel like they don’t have a voice.
Your cups have been part of my story for longer than the incident last week. Back in 2012, when I was 12, a classmate of mine named Mia Hansen started a petition on change.org to ask you to get rid of your styrofoam cups. She got over 133,000 signatures, and your company graciously spoke with her, and made a huge effort to get rid of the styrofoam by the end of 2013. You did this, and we are so happy that you did. However, the plastic replacement is an improvement for the environment, but a downgrade to the population. The condensation on the plastic makes the cup extra slippery, causing massive slips to happen, just like the one I experienced last week. If experiences like this one keep occuring, your loyal customers will slowly deplete which will cause problems for the company in the future.
I implore you to rethink your cup design. Plastic is not biodegradable, and is very slippery to hold. At a minimum, I wish your stores would carry the paper cup sleeves like Starbucks often have. Although your beverages are not hot, the addition of these recyclable sleeves would be beneficial to all of your customers. The sleeves will block the condensation from getting onto customers’ hands, and as a result, the cups would be less likely to slip out of their hands. Additionally, I wish you would consider biodegradable cups. They are more expensive, but better for the environment, and many have ridges along the bottom which also will help them be less slippery for the consumer. This experience has changed many more aspects of my life than one would expect such as if I should carry my food back to my room or should I stay and eat it there, is it worth ordering a my favorite drink which ends up slippery or should I completely avoid the situation by going to the Qdoba right next door.
Fortunately the spilling is a problem that can be solved if we stand for our cause and our right to enjoy the drinks that we all know and love. Even though it was a rough week, the experience helped me shine light on the fact that not all days go as you plan and you must look past the occurrence and keep moving forward. I was able to make lemonade-or, Matcha Green Tea-of a very lemony situation, as reflecting on this incident has helped me explore what changes could happen to prevent this from ever happening again to not only me, but college students and smoothie lovers around the world.
From,
Your Most Loyal Customer
Dasha's Blog 