I stopped by my local Starbucks for a Venti Chai Latte today. Upon entering the Starbucks I couldn’t help but notice ALL the ads for the movie “Akeelah and the Bee“. First I noticed all the signs on the windows. Each sign depicted a different winning spelling bee word from various years. They all had bright green backgrounds with large words reversed out like “shalloon” - winning word from the 1971 spelling bee. They had a travel edition of Scrabble that had “akeelah and the bee” spelled out on playing board. A very crafty ploy but perhaps a bit over the top. Okay, I get it. Starbucks is now shoveling movies down my throat. I guess it wasn’t it enough that I frequent the store to buy an overpriced tea or coffee. Now they need to make more money by putting advertising all over the place.

As I sauntered up to the counter to place my order, a lovely young girl asked if she could get a drink ready for me. I asked for a Venti Chai Latte. She asked my name so she could write it on the cup. I replied “Akeelah” She said “REALLY?” I said “No”. “With all the advertising about “Akeelah and the Bee, I thought it was only fitting to have a hand written advertisement.” So she says “great!” and proceeds to write my so-called-name on the cup.

When the barrista finished preparing my drink she announced “Akeelah?” “Akeelah?” I picked up my drink and noticed that the girl who had originally written the name on the cup actually SPELLED IT WRONG. Interestingly enough the movie is about a spelling bee. The wrapper that’s on the cup has the movie name on it. Funny enough, there are signs all over the store. How ironic that a movie about a spelling bee and that has signs and tons of advertising should be spelled wrong by a Starbucks employee! Nice attention to detail.

A more interesting movie may be Akeelah and the Bee and a Starbucks employee. Yeah, that’s a movie I would go to see.