Surely, if customers cannot readily taste any difference between the instant coffee and the considerably more expensive version brewed in-store, then Starbucks

Surely, if customers cannot readily taste any difference between the instant coffee and the considerably more expensive version brewed in-store, then Starbucks has broken their own business model. That is ridiculous. Two immediate reasons: 1. If brewed costs B and Via costs V, but they price the latter at slightly more than the cost savings (B - V), their profit margin per unit sale has still increased. 2. Even after their double blind super funky scientific rigorous tests end up showing most people cant distinguish between the tastes of the two variants, there will always exist people who are quite willing to pay more for 'premium' versions. Despite these being only same old stuff re-badged.