Starbucks to open 3,000 new stores in the Americas by 2017
Customers queue for coffee at a Starbucks inside the Dulles International Airport complex on August 30, 2011 in Dulles, Virginia, near Washington, DC.
As caffeine addicts know, there is no such thing as too much coffee.
Starbucks appears to agree.
The ubiquitous coffee chain today announced plans to open another 3,000 stores in the Americas over the next five years, with at least half of them to be in the United States.
That would boost the number of Starbucks cafes in the Americas by more than 20 percent and in the US by about 13 percent, Reuters and the Associated Press reported.
Starbucks currently has more than 11,100 stores in the US, according to the AP.
“Starbucks business and brand have never been healthier, and as a company we have never been better positioned to execute against our global, multi-channel growth agenda,” Starbucks chief executive Howard Schultz said at the company’s 2012 Investor Conference, according to a statement on the company’s website.
Schultz said Starbucks would have “more than 20,000 retail stores on six continents by 2014,” compared with the more than 17,500 stores as of July.
Schultz told the AP that the US expansion plans were based “on the current strength of our business.”
The upscale coffee seller said previously it planned to open 1,000 new stores in the US.
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