Starbucks Shutting Down All Teavana Stores
Starbucks announced last week that it will be closing all 379 Teavana stores over the coming year. The move will impact 3,300 workers. "The company concluded that despite efforts to reverse the trend through creative merchandising and new store designs, the underperformance was likely to continue," Starbucks said in its third-quarter earnings press release. Most locations will shut down by spring 2018, Starbucks said, and people employed at Teavana locations will be invited to apply for jobs at Starbucks locations in order to preserve their jobs. The 3,300 employees impacted by these closures "will receive opportunities to apply for positions at Starbucks stores, as Starbucks remains on track to create 240,000 new jobs globally and 68,000 in the U.S. over the next five years," Starbucks said. The coffee giant purchased the struggling tea retailer Teavana in 2012 for $620 million.
Total Retail's Take: Starbucks decision to close all Teavana locations is the latest in a wave of store closings inside American malls. Retailers from J.C. Penney to GameStop have announced plans to shut down brick-and-mortar locations as they struggle to keep pace with e-commerce sites. Despite the Teavana closures, however, Starbucks said it's expanding rapidly, with plans to add 240,000 jobs globally over the next five years. However, most of that growth is taking place overseas, particularly in China.
