Starbucks' growth strategy: locations, locations, locations

Going against conventional retail wisdom, the gourmet coffee giant appears to thrive by putting its
stores close to one another.

©Washington Post, September 3, 2002

On one episode of The Simpsons, Bart saunters into a

mall to get his ear pierced, only to be rushed by the
salesclerk. "Got to make it quick, kiddo," the clerk tells
him. "In five minutes, this place turns into a
Starbucks." As Bart leaves, the distinctive white-on-
green Starbucks name hangs over the old store -- and
over every other storefront in the mall.

Just about everyone has felt like Bart at some point in

the past decade. Consider Washington's hip Dupont Circle area, with four Starbucks stores in eight
blocks. Each serves a customer who might not cross the circle just to grab a latte. The effect is
intentional, and the strategy behind it is as counterintuitive as it may be irritating.

Conventional wisdom dictates that a retailer that crams stores close to one another cannibalizes its
own sales. Yet Starbucks embraced self-cannibalization as the fastest way to expand its business.
Coffee entrepreneur Howard Schultz, who built Starbucks into a global goliath, said that decision
was made in the early 1990s, a few years after he purchased the small chain from its founders. The
company was in what should have been a predicament: two stores across the street from each other
in Vancouver, B.C.

The first, a tiny but top-performing shop, was in a building about to be closed for remodeling. Fearful
of what might happen, Starbucks opened a larger store 30 yards away. Not only did the two stores
coexist, they thrived. Since then, Starbucks has replicated the model with similar results nationwide.
A new Starbucks location typically eats away at the business of the older one nearby -- at first.
Within a year, though, sales at the original store recover. Even if they don't, the company would
rather have one store lose those sales to another Starbucks than to a competitor.

Today, Starbucks has 4,479 locations in North America and 1,256 overseas. It continues to open
three to four stores a day. "We self-cannibalize at least a third of our stores every day," Schultz said.
The approach worked on several fronts. In the early days, when the Seattle coffee company had little
advertising money, it used its storefronts as billboards and clustered them close together. The goals
were to intercept consumers on their commute and build brand awareness through ubiquity. Now,
the nearly $3 billion-a-year empire has inspired thousands of copycats.

It was by no means a revolution in retailing. Franchisees for Dunkin' Donuts saw a similar effect
when they clustered stores in New England. The tactic gave them more street exposure, allowed
them to pool advertising dollars and drove traffic into their stores. "The lesson learned by both
Starbucks and Dunkin' Donuts is that a retailer can create demand where demand is latent," said Jim
McKenna, president of McKenna Associates Corp., a retail real estate training company in Milton,
Mass. "They can increase the size of the pie."

http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/03/news_pf/Business/Starbucks__growth_str.shtml Page 1
From commodity to indulgent necessity

Starbucks blasted open a new market by turning a basic commodity into an indulgent necessity for
the 20-million customers it serves each week, creating an espresso bar culture nonexistent in this
country only two decades ago. American coffee consumption has increased steadily since 1995.
More than 109-million people, about half the adult population, drink coffee every day, and an
additional 52-million (about 25 percent) drink it on occasion, the National Coffee Association of
U.S.A. Inc. reported.

The biggest gains are among daily and occasional drinkers of "gourmet" coffee of the kind
popularized by Starbucks. Those drinkers' ranks grew from 87-million people in 1997 to 150-million
last year. Analysts and rivals say the chain has mastered real estate by picking spots populated with
well-educated, well-paid and well-traveled consumers who appreciate a pricey cup of java. Because
of its "early mover" advantage, Starbucks owns almost half of the nation's 13,500 coffee bars, the
Specialty Coffee Association of America estimates. The market's second-largest player, Diedrich
Coffee Inc. of Irvine, Calif., owner of Gloria Jean's Coffees, lags with a mere 383 stores.

"Starbucks now commands so much "disk space' in consumers' heads that it's extremely difficult to
compete against them," said Nancy Koehn, a professor of business administration at Harvard
Business School. "It built its brand through its storefronts, and that is a very powerful word of
mouth."

Driving a hard bargain

In 1993, the company had its first East Coast spot, on Wisconsin Avenue NW in Washington. Back
then, with 272 stores, Starbucks was already a tough lease negotiator, said Chris Weilminster, vice
president of anchor-tenant leasing for Federal Realty Investment Trust, owner of 23 retail properties
in the region.

The typical mall or strip-mall landlord collects a percentage of sales from a retail tenant in addition
to a base rent, Weilminster said. Under the lease terms, the landlord usually bans the retailer from
opening another store inside a certain radius. The idea is to keep the retailer from cannibalizing its
own sales, thereby depressing the landlord's share. Starbucks chose not to franchise, which meant
staying away from territorial franchisees, who often want to limit new stores. It decided not to
accept landlord restrictions either, believing demand for its coffee would exceed the capacity of any
one store.

"We were willing to accept those terms because they were willing to pay higher rent," Weilminster
said. "They would pay to avoid having those types of radius restrictions." Those deals helped
Starbucks lock in prime real estate, leaving upstart rivals at a disadvantage. The company says it's
nowhere close to saturation nationwide. In a recent call with stock analysts who closely follow the
company's fortunes, Starbucks officials said only seven states have more than 100 Starbucks stores.

"These are still the early days of the company's growth," Schultz said later. Fueling that growth are
Starbucks' impressive customer frequency counts. While consumers visit local shopping malls about
3.7 times a month and their local video store about twice, loyal Starbucks customers come in 18
times a month.

http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/03/news_pf/Business/Starbucks__growth_str.shtml Page 2
A key barometer used by capital markets to gauge a retailer's success are the sales at stores open
more than a year, also known as same-store or comparable-store sales. The more stores a chain
opens in a densely populated area, the more likely its same-store numbers will drop. Also, the
business can suffer if the chain expands so rapidly that its service or the quality of its product slips,
analysts said.

Starbucks is striving to introduce beverages that will attract more customers, of various ages, during
different times of day. In just a decade, it has broadened its menu from 15 to 30 drinks. That's in
addition to the bottled beverages and ice cream it sells in grocery stores. Still, "Going forward, our
efforts to drive growth will extend beyond the innovative products and technology to our real
estate," Orin Smith, Starbucks president and chief executive, told analysts recently.

Too many stores? Not yet

How many stores are too many? Starbucks doesn't seem to know and, for now, financial analysts
don't seem to care. "As long as the performance is there, the question won't be front and center,"
said Patrick Schumann, an analyst with Edward Jones. Last month, Starbucks reported a 20 percent
profit boost in the quarter ended June 30. It netted $56.2-million, compared with $46.8-million a
year earlier.

Same-store sales have fluctuated over the past decade. But they have remained positive for 120
months in a row, with an 8 percent year-over-year gain last quarter. Investors got a solid 14.4
percent return on equity in 2001, comfortably above the 10.4 percent median for Fortune 500
companies that year.

With that track record, Starbucks sees no reason to retrench. Its stores, about 5,700, should double
in number by 2005. In the past quarter, it opened its first stores in Germany and Spain. By year's
end, it expects to open its doors in Puerto Rico and Mexico. In Japan, home of the Starbucks
locations with the highest volume, same-store sales dropped 11 percent in May from the previous
year. Yet Starbucks continues to open two stores a week there. Even with the dip, Schultz said,
average sales per store in Japan are almost double those in U.S. stores.

© Copyright, St. Petersburg Times. All rights reserved.

http://www.sptimes.com/2002/09/03/news_pf/Business/Starbucks__growth_str.shtml Page 3