Starbucks closes controversial Chinese palace outlet

[Foxy Brown]

Starbucks has closed a coffeehouse in China's former imperial palace, the company said Saturday, ending a seven-year presence that sparked protests by Chinese critics who said it stained the image of a key historical site.

[StreakInTheSky]

they probably had another shop within 5 miles anyways

[Guchi_Jnr]

It's good that they finally closed that down.. While I've never been there myself, it's ashame when you go to a beautiful historical/traditional places, only to find corporate America there.

Climbed Mt.Fuji a few years ago, and at the top they had traditional Japanese food shops, and a Coke machine.. Would've been so much nicer if they had an Asahi Beer machine instead..

[kukine]

^ wow it is so out of place, glad it closed down

[dcrux]

Good thing they closed it down. That Starbucks logo looks like an eyesore and it obviously doesn't belong in a place like that.

[Marks Spencer]

Good news for China's bloggers....after all, didn't this all start with one blogger complaining about it? Just like they complained about Shanghai Bounder, Li Yu Chun, US imports, basically everything under the sun!

[ctz]

Well that's a good thing kickin Starbucks out.

In Japan every old temple has vending machines around and that's so ruining the scenery. Coca-Cola is the worst, but I don't think ones painted with Japanese brands' coloes are any better.

[thatguy]

Actually, I never noticed anything out of place with the temples and shrines in Japan. Houryuuji (with the oldest wooden structure in the world) prohibits anything inside its temple grounds; there was no vending machine inside Toudaiji; same with Touji, Byoudouin, Nanzenji, and so on. The worst I noticed is just the thousands of tourists coming through to visit all of those places, and to that end there were stores and vending machines outside the temples. At Nanzenji (and other Zen temples) it's probably harder to tell because some may not be able to identify the "main gate". In many temples there aren't even bathrooms inside the temple grounds, and signs warn visitors to use the outside bathrooms in advance.

Overall Japan does a pretty damn good job of protecting its national and cultural treasures. The only real distraction are the hundreds of school girls that visit temples like Kinkakuji, taking pictures with their keitai