Starbucks

Starbucks pulls espresso to order in coffeehouses across all 50 states and the District of Columbia. The chain opened as a shop selling beans. An espresso bar arrived years later, and that late sequence still shapes how the board reads today.

What follows covers the founding, the company that grew out of it, and the shape of the US estate today.

Starbucks History

Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl and Gordon Bowker opened the first Starbucks in 1971, in Seattle’s Pike Place Market. Roasted whole bean coffee, tea, spices and brewing equipment filled the shelves, sold by the pound for brewing at home. No drink was poured at that counter. An espresso bar reached that Pike Place shop only in 1987, sixteen years after the first pound of beans went on sale. Every drink Starbucks pours today descends from that one bar, and the bean shelves never left.

Starbucks Corporation incorporated under the laws of the State of Washington in 1985, fourteen years after that first shop opened. The retail business and the legal entity carry different birthdays as a result. Brian Niccol runs the company as chairman and chief executive officer, having arrived from Chipotle Mexican Grill. Head office sits on Utah Avenue South in Seattle, a few miles south of the market where the first shelves of beans went up.

Starbucks trades from roughly 16,900 US locations, reaching all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Around six in ten operate as company stores. Those cover the standalone units, the strip-mall shops and the drive-thrus. Licensees run the rest, from the kiosk inside a Target to counters in grocery aisles, airports, hotels, hospitals and campuses. Espresso pulled to order anchors every one of those boards, whoever runs the store.

Starbucks Menus & Details

Five pages carry the detail behind the counter, each pairing an item name with its price and its calorie figure on the same row.

Starbucks prices run section by section here, with a calorie figure beside every item.

Red Eye, Butterbeer Frappuccino and the rest come with the wording to use at the till.

The Bacon, Gouda & Egg Sandwich and every other item name what they declare, allergen by allergen.

The afternoon buy-one-get-one window Starbucks runs through its app, which drinks qualify, and how the timing actually works.

The Pumpkin Spice Latte and the rest of the seasonal board, with prices and calorie figures.