Starbucks San Diego mug: Been There Series

By The Starbucks Cups team · Last checked 2026-11-15 · How we make these pages

Starbucks Been There Series San Diego mug with San Diego in blue script, a bicycle under a gate, a beer glass, a taco and a lighthouse by the handle — Front view · numbered markers match the list below Show markers

The San Diego mug from Starbucks' Been There Series writes San Diego in blue script above a bicycle, a taco and a beer, with the Old Point Loma Lighthouse by the handle, a racehorse and a seal on the side, and the San Diego-Coronado Bridge and CORONADO ISLAND on the back.

Series: Been There Series
Place: San Diego, California, USA
Type: Mug
Released: Not confirmed
Capacity: 14 fl ozstandard mug size
SKU: Not confirmed

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The taco Ralph Rubio brought home from Baja

In 1978, Ralph Rubio went to Baja California on spring break, tasted a fish taco, and got the recipe from the vendor who made it, a man named Carlos ^[1]. He later persuaded his businessman father to join him in opening a restaurant on the site of a failed hamburger joint in San Diego ^[1]. The original Rubio's, on Mission Bay Drive in Pacific Beach, opened in 1983 ^[2]. Four decades later, in June 2024, the chain shut 48 California restaurants at once, 13 of them in San Diego County ^[2]. The company blamed the rising cost of doing business in the state ^[2]. Twenty-nine Rubio's were still open in the county afterward, the original among them ^[2]. The taco on the mug (6) may be a fish one.

The mug does not label its drawings, so connecting this one to the story is our reading.

What's on the mug

1
San Diego lettering
San Diego is hand-lettered in dark blue script across the upper front. It is the largest text on the mug.
2
Jet and clouds
A jet with a pointed nose and swept tail fins streaks across the top edge of the front, drawn in outline among small clouds. It is not colored in, unlike the blue jet on the back. The mug doesn't name the aircraft.
3
Bicycle
A road bicycle with drop handlebars, drawn in dark blue outline, stands under the gate at the bottom of the front. The mug doesn't say what it stands for.
4
Gate and cloud
Two thin posts hold a blue band with an oval medallion in the middle and curling ironwork above it. A pale blue cloud shape sits on top of the gate, over the bicycle. We could not match the gate to a specific place, and the mug doesn't name it.
5
Beer glass
An orange glass of beer with a white foam head and a handle sits at the left of the front, with a small hop-like cone beside it. The mug doesn't name a brewery or a beer.
6
Taco
A folded taco with an orange shell and a frilly blue filling sits at the lower left of the front. The drawing doesn't show what the filling is.
7
Sun and Old Point Loma Lighthouse
An orange sun with long rays sits near the handle, and below it a lighthouse lantern sends out beams from the middle of a blue-roofed house with a row of windows. A lantern rising out of a house roof is the layout of the Old Point Loma Lighthouse, built as a Cape Cod style dwelling with its tower in the center. The house is cut off by the curve of the mug near the handle, and the mug doesn't name it.^[4]
8
Palm tree Side view
A tall palm tree with pale blue fronds and a long thin trunk stands at the left of the side view.
9
Racehorse (may refer to Del Mar) Side view
A blue horse with a saddle cloth gallops across the middle of the side view, with no rider. It may stand for horse racing at the Del Mar Thoroughbred Club, the seaside track north of the city, but the mug doesn't name a track.^[6]
10
Mission-style building with orange towers Side view
Two orange towers with arched openings and notched tops rise at each end of a long arcade with a grey-blue roof, with blue arched gateways topped by small domes in front. The same orange tower and blue arch show at the left edge of the front photo. The style is Spanish mission, but the towers have flat tops rather than domes, and we could not match the building to one San Diego landmark.
11
Sailboat Side view
A small sailboat with an orange sail floats on wavy lines at the bottom of the side view.
12
San Diego-Coronado Bridge Back view
An orange bridge deck on tall square piers rises out of the water and runs almost level, curving down towards the water at the right end, across the top of the back. With the words CORONADO ISLAND printed below, this is the San Diego-Coronado Bridge, which climbs from Coronado and curves toward San Diego over the bay. The drawing shows four piers and the deck only.^[3]
13
Blue fighter jet Back view
A blue fighter jet climbs nose-up with exhaust lines beneath it on the back. It looks like a Navy F/A-18 Hornet, but the drawing is too simple to be sure, and the mug doesn't name the aircraft or a base.
14
CORONADO ISLAND lettering and houses Back view
The words CORONADO ISLAND are lettered under a row of small blue-roofed houses and palm trees on the back.
15
AMERICAS FINEST CITY IN MOTION lettering Back view
The words AMERICAS FINEST CITY IN MOTION are printed in dark blue capitals in two lines on the back, between the bridge and the jet. No apostrophe is visible in the photo; the second Been There San Diego mug reads AMERICA'S FINEST CITY, without IN MOTION.
16
Beach ball
A striped beach ball in pale blue and orange floats under the word San on the front.
17
Starbucks iced drink cup Side view
A clear cold cup with a domed lid, a straw and whipped cream carries a green dot where the Starbucks logo would be, at the top of the side view.
18
Hop cones (probably) Side view
Two small blue cone shapes, one with a leaf, hang beside the palm trunk on the side view. They are probably hop cones, the flowers used in brewing beer, and a similar one sits beside the beer glass on the front. The mug doesn't label them.
19
Walled cove (may be the Children's Pool, La Jolla) Side view
A patch of pale blue water is held inside a curved wall topped with a railing at the lower left of the side view. It looks like the Children's Pool in La Jolla, a small beach partly enclosed by a seawall, but the drawing has no label.^[5]
20
Seal Side view
A small seal sits upright on its flippers near the bottom of the side view, drawn in outline. It may be one of the harbor seals that rest on the beach at the Children's Pool in La Jolla; the mug doesn't say.^[5]
21
Leafy tree Side view
A tree with a branching trunk and clumps of pale blue foliage stands at the lower right of the side view. We could not identify the species from the drawing.
22
Surfboard Side view
A tall surfboard drawn in outline stands at the left edge of the side view, with an orange curling wave across it. The same board shows at the right edge of the back photo.
23
Sand pail and shovel Back view
A pale blue sand pail with a lid tipped open holds an orange shovel, below the lettering on the back.
24
Small palm tree Back view
A small outlined palm tree stands at the left of the back, next to the blue jet.

The photos show the front, one side and the back. The strip of the design under the handle, the inside and the underside are out of view.

Collector notes

Our checklist lists two Been There San Diego entries with the same drawings, but the back lettering differs: this one reads AMERICAS FINEST CITY IN MOTION, while the second reads AMERICA'S FINEST CITY with an apostrophe and no IN MOTION, so they look like two printings. This page describes the first.
The words AMERICAS FINEST CITY IN MOTION and CORONADO ISLAND, the orange bridge and the blue fighter jet are on the back, so a front-only photo does not show the Coronado half of the design.

Before you buy

The photos show the front, one side and the back; the strip under the handle and the inside are not visible. The Coronado bridge, the blue fighter jet, a sand pail and the words CORONADO ISLAND are on the back, not the front. Our checklist lists two Been There San Diego entries with the same drawings; this one's back reads AMERICAS FINEST CITY IN MOTION, the other's reads AMERICA'S FINEST CITY.