The Starbucks mobile app and Apple Pay have had an amazing amount of influence on both the consumer conversation and general attitudes about mobile payments. This is all the more impressive when you realize that Apple Pay today represents barely 0.05% of all in-store retail transactions.

Nonetheless, the perception persists that mobile payment acceptance is widespread, as illustrated on Thursday (Oct. 29) during a Starbucks investor call.

During the call, Andrew Charles, a vice president at Cowen who had spent seven years previously as an analyst with Bank of America Merrill Lynch, posed this question: “With Mobile Order & Pay and delivery coming soon and the marketing opportunities these have, do you view straight-up mobile payment as something that will ultimately become obsolete or will it still have its place given the robust customer data you receive from it as well as the convenience?”

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