Dicey Myer sipped her coffee while working on her resume in the very Starbucks where she hoped to work. Having found an assortment of resume examples and handy tips, she observed her surroundings. She’d always enjoyed a good latte, but what made Starbucks unique?
After comparing her consumer-side appreciation with the values stated on the coffee shop walls and company website, Dicey realized she might be a better fit for their barista position than she’d thought! She tweaked her past barista and customer service experience to reflect her alignment on her new Starbucks barista resume, and was thrilled to get a phone call not long after applying.
If you’re vying for a barista role at Starbucks like Dicey, you might just benefit from this guide and our resume tips.
Related resume examples
What Matters Most: Your Starbucks Barista Skills & Work Experience
Starbucks baristas always need to think quickly on their feet to keep long lines of customers moving. Therefore, your top skills will be essential to optimize on your resume to show you have what it takes.
Certain Starbucks locations offer unique food and beverage services to their customers, so there isn’t one cut-and-dry set of skills a location may be looking for from applicants. One Starbucks may operate a traditional drive-through, whereas another offers a mixology bar. Review the job description to optimize for the products and services at the Starbucks you’re applying to.
Here are some of the most popular Starbucks barista skills to get you started.
9 most popular Starbucks barista skills
- Food Handling
- Recipes
- Customer Service
- Brewing Techniques
- POS Systems
- Cash Handling
- Sanitization
- Teamwork
- Culinary Art
Sample Starbucks barista work experience bullet points
At Starbucks, the food and beverage quality always matters to provide a great customer experience. To ensure standards are maintained, Starbucks hiring managers will pay close attention to the work achievements you list on your resume.
Food and beverage prep comes with its share of metrics like order accuracy and customers served per hour. Leaning into those numbers whenever possible will help you stand out.
Remember, Starbucks is a fast-paced business. Keeping your examples short and straightforward will help hiring managers identify your top skills in brewing techniques and teamwork while quickly reviewing resumes.
Here are a few samples:
- Informed customers about the benefits of the rewards program, generating an average of 5 new signups per shift.
- Carefully counted change on cash orders to go 11 months with no cash drawer overages or shortages.
- Used accurate data entry skills to process customer orders with 98% accuracy over 2 years.
- Explained the quality of specialty items to customers to generate 68% more sales on seasonal products.
Top 5 Tips for Your Starbucks Barista Resume
- Limit it to one page
- Starbucks hiring managers will want to see a concise overview of your top skills in customer service and food handling. Keeping to a one-page resume provides enough information while still allowing for a quick review within a fast-paced food service environment.
- Reverse chronological order is optimal
- You want to ensure your resume starts strong. Putting your most recent experiences first will help since those will likely be the most relevant and up-to-date with current food service and cleanliness standards.
- Always proofread
- Order accuracy will be one of your top priorities when you’re on staff. Start things off right with an accurate resume that’s free of grammatical errors.
- Use action words to stand out
- Action words like “brewed” or “informed” will make your examples stand out. For instance, you could say you “brewed over 45 beverages per day with 98% order accuracy for four years.”
- Both interpersonal and technical skill matter
- Baristas must accurately prepare specialty beverages and interact in a friendly and helpful way with customers. Your examples should emphasize how you achieved both, such as how you greeted 40 customers per day and followed recipes to prepare accurate orders, achieving 97% positive satisfaction scores.
If you don’t have much work experience, a resume objective can be a helpful way to display your most relevant skills. For example, you could write a few sentences about how you’re eager to get started in the food service industry and will perform accurately using your 2 years of data entry experience.
Aim to include as many transferable skills as possible. Abilities in customer service, cash handling, data entry, and more can all translate to managing tons of orders and customers daily as a Starbucks barista.
Most Starbucks locations list the cover letter as optional. However, including one will help you stand out. You can create a cover letter that connects your passion for Starbucks (if you love drinking their coffee) with how you’ll provide a great customer service experience as a barista.
