What's happening to my Starbucks?

I've never run a retail business, and probably never will. 

So I don't know if I'm qualified to write this.

But I'm a regular at a local Starbucks in Plano so I feel a certain ownership in this particular store. I've made several friends there and spent many hours there. So recent developments have dissapointed me. 

Recently we got a new manager who doesn't appear to be interested in customer relations -- which since I started going to to this Starbucks a year and a half has always been the heartbeat of the store. The new manager comes from a drivethru store, which might be at the root of the problem. 

This is not a drivethru. Everyone knows everyone. The relationship between barista and customer and customer and barista is hurting. The new manager doesn't seem to get the importance of the contact between barista and customer and customer and barista. And so my Starbucks is hurting, and customers are starting to notice. 

When a barista leaves the store, it's an event. Under previous management, the give-and-take between barista and customer was such a big part of things. Cutting up with each other. Insulting each other. That is gone now. 

And now sources are telling me that the new manager is on a rampage with her baristas to stop rewarding customers with free beverages, something that was appreciated by the regulars. Hence, the regular customer doesn't feel like he or she are being rewarded for giving them business.This store is turning into a money-grabbing enterprise, something that dogs Starbucks around the country, but never has at this location. 

I write this from "It's a Grind," a coffee shop that is a few more miles away from my Starbucks. It's my first visit. I don't know how often I'll come here, but if things continue to fall apart at my Starbucks, that might change.