Do You Even Sip, Bro?

Happy Sunday! The bots are fighting… Elon Musk’s xAI has sued ChatGPT-owner OpenAI in Northern California federal court, Sherwood News reported on Thursday, alleging that OpenAI “induced” recruits that it had poached to steal and share xAI’s trade secrets.

Today we’re exploring how protein-maxxing “broistas” are luring coffee consumers away from Starbucks, and why Walmart’s new prescription offering gives it a cool edge against pharma competitors.

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Do you even sip, bro?

Nearly 10 years ago, Starbucks, deploying references to “the craftsmanship of the Milanese barista,” announced that it would open its first-ever store in Italy. Fast-forward to earlier this month, and the company has made a decidedly American menu decision: after netting its highest US sales week in company history, Starbucks announced it would add protein-infused cold foam and protein lattes to its menu. 

Americans’ preferences, as it turns out, are not as timeless as Italy’s vaunted coffee culture. We’ve now entered a consumer landscape in the throes of a protein renaissance, where “grams of protein per grande beverage” is a unit of both measurement… and aspiration.

Recently, as Starbucks saw its same-store sales dip 2% year over year in Q2 2025, the biggest gainer (+6.1%) across the whole quick-service kingdom was Dutch Bros — an Oregon-born coffee chain where employees are sincerely called “broistas” and its menu has entire sections of “protein coffee” options, smoothies, and energy drinks with names like Tiger’s Blood and Kick in Da Face. 

Indeed, Dutch Bros reported notching almost $416 million in revenue in Q2 across its mainly drive-thru-only stores. The company recently hit the 1,000-store mark across 19 states and not only plans to open 160 more outposts in the second half of this year, but it also recently revised its national growth plan upward from 4,000 stores to 7,000 stores. 

Dutch Bros isn’t alone in incorporating the growing lust for functional (or perhaps hyperfunctional) coffee and energy drinks into its model: 7 Brew Coffee has also opened nearly 500 stores across 34 states since 2017. Can Starbucks successfully tap into younger consumers’ demands as these coffee contenders have?

Read online: “Broistas” and protein-maxxing: Dutch Bros and other unlikely coffee challengers are terrifying Starbucks