Want to buy a latte? There’s an app for that
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JEREMY HOBSON: Starbucks announced today that customers can now pay for their coffee with their smart phones. So no need to bring a Visa to buy a Venti.
Marketplace’s Nancy Marshall Genzer has more.
NANCY MARSHALL GENZER: Initially, you’ll have to have a BlackBerry, iPhone or iPod Touch to make mobile payments at Starbucks. You select “touch to pay” on your phone, a bar code pops up. You scan your phone at the register, and you’re done. Almost seven thousand company-run Starbucks will accept the mobile payments. More then a thousand Starbucks in Target stores will, too. Gary Arlen of Arlen Communications says Target, and other retailers, will probably follow Starbucks’s lead.
GARY ARLEN: The appeal for the store is faster payment, validation, and speed of processing people through the checkout line.
Arlen says payments also take less time to transfer into stores accounts when customers use their phones – and retailers certainly like that.
In Washington, I’m Nancy Marshall Genzer for Marketplace.
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