According to a recent Reuters article, some coffee drinkers are now celebrating the latest economic hardships facing Starbucks (NASDAQ:SBUX).

Here's a quote from the article:

"I'm so happy. I'm so not a Starbucks person," said Melinda Vigliotti, sipping iced coffee at the Irving Farm Coffee House in New York. "I believe in supporting small businesses. Starbucks, bye-bye."

And there are quite a few folks who share this woman's opinion too.

Unfortunately, while bashing the brewer for being "too big" or "putting the smaller coffee shops out of business," few take the time to come down off of their moral high ground to realize that if wasn't for Starbucks creating a new coffee culture to begin with, half of those little independent coffee shops wouldn't even exist!

I'd also like to know if folks like Vigliottii realize that with Starbucks closing 600 stores, up to 12,000 jobs could be lost. Talk about hurting local economies!

There are also the local economies outside the U.S. that rely on Starbucks for their livelihoods. These will be affected too. Especially when it comes to all of those fair trade operations.

Starbucks is one of the largest purchasers of Fair Trade Certified coffee in the world. The company's global purchases of Fair Trade Certified coffee totaled 20 million pounds in 2007.

Let's also not forget the fact that Starbucks recently stopped serving core diary products that contain rBGH.

rBGH is a hormone typically given to cows on conventional dairy farms to increase production. Unfortunately, it's also known to cause udder infections, lameness, and reproductive problems. rBGH has also been criticized for increasing a growth hormone in cows and humans known as IGF-1. It has been suggested that elevated levels of IGF-1 have been associated with increased cancer rates.

I wonder how many of those local coffee shops use rBGH-free dairy products.

I wonder how many brew Fair Trade Certified coffee.

I wonder how many can provide employment for 12,000 U.S. workers.

Jeff