New Hack City

On hacks and attempting to steam coconut milk from a can.

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The first “hack” drink I ever made was a double espresso over ice, served in a 16oz cup. I remember innocently making the drink, only to watch the patron take it over to the condiment bar, pour milk almost to the top of the cup, and walk away with an iced latte, all for the price of an espresso.

At first, this indiscretion made me angry. Then my boss told me if it was the way someone needed to order a drink, then that was their prerogative. It was a trivial thing for us to be upset about—I worked in a busy cafe that did well, and the free milk wasn’t going to make a difference to our bottom line. Besides, who am I to judge anyone getting an extra two bucks off their beverage?

But I still wondered about that transaction. When I asked my boss if he thought it was a financial thing, he said that while he could never be sure, he thought it was much more about the satisfaction of “gaming the system.” This person had discovered a loophole, customized the menu to fit their needs, and walked away victorious.

Hacking Up

Lately, there’s been a lot of attention paid to these “hacks,” or non-publicized modifications that patrons can make to set menu items. Hacks are touted for a wide range of food and drink businesses, but I see them associated most commonly with coffee shops, and most notably fueled by Starbucks. If you type the phrase “secret menu” into your search bar, hundreds of articles with suggestions for newfangled concoctions come up. It’s even gotten to the point where those secret menus change by the season, with articles suggesting whimsical Halloween-themed beverages, like a Zombie Frappuccino or the Wednesday Addams Drink. 

Last month, Jaya Saxena wrote an incredible piece for Eater about the growing practice of menu hacking, noting, “In recent years, the menu hack has gone into overdrive. Proliferated by YouTube, Instagram, and now TikTok as well as online ordering apps, these hacks are more complicated than ever — asking for two sauces or extra-crispy fries no longer cuts it.”  

Hacking a drink or creating an original off-menu item can feel special, beyond anything to do with price or taste. (I don’t doubt there are people for whom hacks are a cost-saving strategy or a means to receive a highly specific combination of flavors, but I’d also guess these folks are in the minority.) In analyzing the appeal of secret menus, Matthew Philp, a marketing professor, told the CBC, “Here’s this special thing that only I know about — or not many people know about. And so that makes you feel a little bit in the know; you feel good about yourself for knowing these things.”

But, as Saxena notes, hacks are getting pretty baroque, particularly at Starbucks. The company’s digital ordering app individualizes every ingredient, meaning you can pick pretty much any assortment of components and flavors, press “order,” and reasonably expect to see your creation waiting for you when you walk in. 

I think this is a critical inflection point because, for the most part, hacks aren’t a big deal. Like the “two shots of espresso to make an iced latte” experience taught me, if I can reasonably do something for someone, if it doesn’t hurt others, I probably won’t have an issue with it (I’d argue the espresso/latte example is just pushing the edge of acceptability). Mix skim milk and oat milk for your latte? Sure! Pour decaf coffee into your triple-shot cappuccino? Why not? Put a pump of every syrup into your latte? Sounds yum! 

My partner used to work at Starbucks over a decade ago, and he reminded me that the layout behind the bar, at least while he worked there, was designed to maximize efficiency. He also affirmed that customizations aren’t particularly annoying, so long as they’re feasible. Heck, Burger King essentially used hacking your food order as its entire ad campaign for years (“Have It Your Way” became the official slogan of the fast food chain in 1974, and is only being given an overhaul this year). 

When hacks aren’t a big deal and relatively easy to execute, I can guarantee most service workers are keen to heed them. A 2016 Thrillist article quotes a Reddit thread of baristas saying that they don’t care much about making some wild drink as long as customers know what’s in it and ask nicely. For my part, I once recounted a story on Boss Barista about a woman who insisted on bringing in her own coconut milk for me to steam, which I obliged (I shouldn’t have—this is most certainly a health code violation), only to discover she meant a can of coconut milk rather than anything barista-grade—and didn’t even think I wouldn’t have a can opener behind the bar. 

I truly believe most baristas will accommodate relatively straightforward hacks without complaint. But when those requests become unreasonable—both in execution and in terms of the customer-worker power balance—is when we need to think about scaling them back. 

Know What You’re Getting Into

One of the interviews I found both incredibly insightful and wildly off-putting in Saxena’s article was with JP Lambiase. Lambiase has built a whole brand out of hacking food items, and points out that if you’ve worked in food service, you’ve definitely hacked an item or two. 

Case in point: The Drinks Only Baristas Order. Think “a 4oz coffee,” or “an iced cortado” (a drink I both made for baristas and was told to tell customers we could not make at the same cafe), or a baby mocha in a cappuccino cup. Technically, these are all hacks. But, as Saxena’s article mentions, while many early hacks came from service workers, they have since been co-opted by people who may never have worked a service job in their lives. She writes: “Across TikTok there are countless videos of baristas whipping up multicolored drinks with cutesy names; numerous Reddit threads chronicle tips and tricks from fast food employees.” 

Until hacking culture became mainstream, I’d guess most people requesting hacks were doing it with a full understanding of what they were about to receive, or potentially working around allergies and food sensitivities. 

In contrast, many people ordering hacked items now might not actually know much about what they’re getting. Someone ordering the viral Starbucks “Pink Drink” (a combination of freeze-dried strawberries, coconut milk, and strawberry-acai juice that became so popular it is now a permanent option on the menu) might not know it has green coffee extract—and that a 24oz Venti size Pink Drink has 70mg of caffeine.

Can I Speak With the Manager? 

I was surprised by Lambiase’s reaction to criticism about how hacks have made baristas’ lives difficult. “Lambiase says plainly, ‘No,’ when I ask him if he thinks about how hard these customizations might be for workers,” Saxena writes. “‘One [worker] a month might get a guy that does this. And it’s annoying, so they’re very vocal about it,’ he speculates.” He goes on further to say that baristas should complain to corporate if they are annoyed.

I agree with part of this sentiment: Customers shouldn’t be responsible for taking advantage of loopholes. If a business dislikes these practices, it can make them much more difficult for patrons to participate in. But there are two problems with this: Starbucks is embracing hacking culture; and more importantly, Starbucks seems to have a problem listening to its employees. 

As noted above, hacked drinks have made their way to the permanent menu. Starbucks sees value in them, and the brand seems keen to listen to consumer trends.Listening to baristas? That’s another story. 

We know what happens when baristas stand up for themselves. As of this writing, 231 Starbucks locations have voted to unionize. However, Starbucks has fought union efforts at every turn: the National Labor Relations Board has accused it of dozens of labor violations. One former manager testified that he was instructed to find ways to punish pro-union employees. Allegations against the brand have gotten so bad that four U.S. senators asked Starbucks to detail exactly how it was handling the growing union drive. In a comment to Reuters, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said, “[Starbucks is] weaponizing benefits and wage increases to discourage workers from organizing.” 

This timing is on the nose. I don’t think hacks are innately bad, but it’s telling when you examine the proliferation of hacked drinks against the mounting growth of union efforts—when you look at the additional demands being heaped on workers who are being blocked at every step in their struggle for better pay and better conditions.  With some former employees indicating that they’re timed on how long they take to make drinks, I can see how onerous customized orders can be stressful and difficult to manage, on top of what is already a demanding job. 

Maybe there’s a way to make hacks work better for the people making the drinks—or maybe they can even be transformed into a symbol of solidarity for those supporting unionizing workers. It’d be cool to see, among the hundreds of TikTok secret menu drinks, a bunch of pro-union folks going hard with wild drinks in their hands. Hacks aren’t innately irritating, but the idea that someone has to completely warp their workspace and respond to ever-changing consumer whims is what’s exhausting.

Photo by Andrew Keymaster