How Starbucks May Help Save South Central

Corporate retailers and the American ghetto: a successful combination?

1 minute read

January 11, 2006, 7:00 AM PST

By David Gest


"The recent opening of a Starbucks in the notorious Los Angeles suburb of Compton may offer area residents much more than a three-dollar latte. It is, of course, another example of the decade-old trend in which major corporate retailers target 'urban markets' in America's poorest minority communities. But the project, a joint venture with Magic Johnson's ambitious Johnson Development Corporation, might also be a blueprint for an entirely new way of thinking about inner-city revitalization: a way that emphasizes civic discourse just as much as it employs more traditional paths to revitalization, like economic development."

Thanks to Seth Brown

Sunday, January 1, 2006 in The Next American City

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