Customers at a Rio Rancho Starbucks got a special treat with their morning coffee Thursday: kindness.

Students at Enchanted Hills Elementary School partnered with the Starbucks at Southern and Unser to help spread kindness through the City of Vision.

EHES fifth-grade teacher Amy Villanueva got an idea from Tik Tok to have her students decorate Starbucks cup sleeves with positive and inspirational messages. EHES principal Jennifer Bartley liked the idea and decided it’s something the entire school should do.

“It’s really important to us to kind of build relationships and have a good sense of community,” Villanueva said. “And for us, it’s showing our students that it’s good for us to do things for other people. Be kind, pass the message along and develop relationships with everyone in our community.”

Students spent last week decorating more than 1,000 cup sleeves that were distributed with hot drinks Aug. 24, which is the busiest of the year for Starbucks as the beloved pumpkin spice latte returns to the menu.

The decorated sleeves made a positive impact on Victoria and Gage Davis, who had breakfast in the store Thursday morning.

“It actually got us talking about art,” Victoria Davis said.

“It was a very nice surprise, very colorful,” said Gage Davis. “It’s very nice to feel like you’re part of the community. It’s really cool to see people making sure that things are right for the next generation.”

Some of the messages were “Keep Smiling,” “You’ve got this,” and “Love.”

“We want everyone in the community to know how special these kids are, how much they care about each other, about our community as a whole,” Villanueva said. “We want them to know that we just want to spread kindness. We want everyone to pass it on. If one person did one kind thing and we just kept it going, it would continue on and on and on.”