Starbucks partners with Uber Eats to deliver lattes, Frappuccinos to customers Starbucks announced Thursday it is partnering with Uber Eats to deliver its coffee to customers. (CNBC)
haha....home delivery of coffee. What's next, home delivery of water? We're going back to the milkman days.
Battle brewing. Luckin Coffee wants to surpass Starbucks as the largest coffee chain in China this year. Luckin, launched last January, has 2,000 stores across China, while Starbucks has over 3,500 and is expanding at the rate of one shop every 15 hours. But Luckin plans to do one every four, adding 2,500 locations to its network throughout 2019. It's possible: many Luckin locations are just pick-up shops for online orders. Reuters
Coffee Crisis Sixty percent of the world's coffee species are on the brink of extinction. These are wild coffee species, and the two (yes, only two) species that we brew are not directly under threat. However, experts say we will eventually need to use genes from wild species to maintain the viability of the Arabica and robusta beans that we use; tricky to do if they've gone extinct. BBC
Robusta business. Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson says it's "unlikely" that China's coffeehouse start-up Luckin will surpass it in terms of store numbers this year. Luckin, which was founded in 2018, claimed in January that it would outstrip Starbucks in China by the end of the year. Luckin wants to open 4,500 stores by 2020, many of which will be small "delivery kitchens" designed to fulfil online orders. Johnson said Luckin's smaller venues aren't comparable to Starbucks' over 3,600 China stores. Reuters
Starbucks testing compostable, recyclable cups in San Francisco, Seattle The company announced on Wednesday that it is testing out a compostable cup in San Francisco and four other locations — New York, Seattle, Vancouver and London. Starbucks showed one of the cups being tested during its annual shareholder meeting on Wednesday. The new cup looks just like Starbucks’ current paper cup. The difference is inside, where instead of a plastic liner, a biodegradable liner serves as a barrier to make sure liquid doesn’t leak out. (CBS)