My (not-so) Secret Addiction - Starbucks Mugs!

I think it's pretty common for people to collect things from places they travel to. Fridge magnets seem to be a very popular item. (My grandmother, who rarely got to travel in her life, was always proud of the magnets covering her fridge, showing her all of the places her grandchildren had been). T-shirts or shot glasses from the local Hard Rock Cafe are another popular thing to collect.

Also ranking up there in the travel collectables department is what I try pick up wherever I visit - a Starbucks mug. According to this website, as of today February 11, 2013, there are 2,382 different designs of Starbucks mugs that have been produced. That's a crazy number of mugs!

I am NOT attempting to collect them all. Not only do we not have the ROOM, I don't have the desire. I am collecting them as a reminder of where I have been, so I am only interested in the mugs that are have city names on them, and not the general Starbucks mugs.

I've come up with a set of "collecting rules" to keep the number of mugs in our cupboard to a reasonable level:

• I will only buy a mug in a place I am actually visiting
  
• A connection at an airport does NOT count as visiting
  
• I do not ask (or want) friends to get the mugs for me when they are traveling
  
• I will only collect the city mugs; I do not collect the country mugs (except if only the country one is produced, or as per below with the espresso mugs)
  
• In places where they sell the city espresso mugs (generally only outside of North America), I will buy those instead of the full-sized coffee mugs to save room. These always come in packages of two espresso mugs: one with the city design and one with the country design.
  

I think my collection is up to about 20 full-sized city mugs, and 6 pairs of espresso mugs. (This is a paltry number compared to many people I know, but I've only recently started collecting!)  In time, I plan to photograph them all and have them catalogued on this site. (Steven suggests "once you photograph them we can get rid of some of them, right?". Of course, the answer is NO!)

I'm looking forward to our cruise next month for many reasons, not the least of which is being able to get more mugs for the collection. For sure I should be able to add Singapore, Bangkok and Hong Kong. The big question mark is if the Starbucks which JUST opened in Ho Chi Minh City will have mugs available!

Do you have something you collect when you travel? Let me know in the comments below.