I pretty much completely agree with you. Starbucks is terrible. Not only is their coffee bad, but they provide a very poor example of what coffee actually is. Also - as long as they pretend to be the "upper class" of the coffee industry, they give premium coffee a very bad name.
I know a lot about coffee and I used to feel the same way about its taste. If you want a different perspective, from someone who has learned a lot about the entire industry, give this a read. It's the last in a six-part series that I wrote a couple of months ago. The first five are linked in it. It might change your mind and I would encourage you to give coffee a chance like I did.
There is excellent coffee out there that is much cheaper than you would think and that actually tastes good. You just have to know what to look for.
I read your post, great work there, but I fear that coffee is just something I will never find tasty. I will try a sip if I come across any that you mentioned at the end there.
I know the feeling, trust me. I spent my entire life completely hating coffee - the smell, the taste, the mere mention of it. Then, a couple of years ago, I actually tried a truly premium coffee that had not been pre-ground and sitting on a store shelf for weeks or months. At first, I refused to try it, because I just knew I wasn't going to like it.
I was wrong.
Less than a year later, I started organizing a business to work with coffee farmers, directly purchasing, importing, and selling their coffee here in the United States. I just recently met with an investor and we should be moving things forward after the new year. I may even be selling the beans through an online store that accepts Steem. We'll see what happens.
Just for the record - even most of the small coffee shops these days simply buy their coffee from the large importers and basically all do the same thing. You won't find many who actually have good coffee that's worth drinking as it is. I bought a "premium" cup from a local shop that pretends to be the solution to Starbucks and their awful coffee...and I threw it out less than halfway through. It actually made me feel sick for a couple of hours. It's hard to screw up good coffee, but there sure are a lot of companies doing their best to serve garbage to their customers. It's really sad.
https://www.kickinghorsecoffee.com/en/coffee/454-horse-power-whole-bean
It's certified organic and Fairtrade? Sign me up!
/sarcasm
They might have good coffee, but I'm not too fond of certifications. Most are useless as far as product quality and ethics are concerned. Here's a bit of info on Fairtrade from the first post of the series I mentioned above.
Well I have been following you for a long time now, since before your Sherlock Holmes'ing with the sockpuppets - great job there BTW. If you make a post telling us where we can get these magic beans I will buy some, if I don't like it I am sure someone around me will. :D