Present Tense »

• O’Briens, Brody Sweeney and good taste

  April 2, 2008 @ 9:23 am | by Shane Hegarty

  As a letter writer points out today, for Brody Sweeney in a book review on Monday to describe Starbucks coffee as “awful” is somewhat hypocritical.

  Here is what Sweeney said of his rival:

  The fact Starbucks can sell such awful coffee is a testament to the power of branding. For in truth, the quality of the coffee is not the reason people shop there, it’s because it’s cool, and convenient, and they have tapped into the “third place” social phenomenon – and they are brilliant marketeers.

  Which begs the question, how did O’Briens manage to become successful by selling even worse coffee?

• Saturday column: Teeth returned to food critics

  March 17, 2008 @ 5:00 pm | by Shane Hegarty

  During a four-year spell as this newspaper’s TV reviewer, I would get an occasional, but forceful, sense of a subject’s displeasure.

  I was once called a cretin on live radio.

  A passing remark about a particularly ubiquitous Northern Irish entertainer was followed by a letter accusing me of having an anti-Northern bias. I didn’t, but I had developed an anti-ubiquitous Northern Irish entertainer bias. (more…)