Starbucks is chasing Gen Z longing, betting on a billion dollars on a plan to “third place”

On Thursday, the coffee giant revealed one billion dollars Restructuring plan This will close more than 100 cafes in North America, reduce 900 unavailable jobs, and reshape more than 1,000 sites.

RESET CEO said that it was reseting around the restoration Warm and comfort-An effort to re -create his “third place” motive since Take Last year, the break between the home and the work that made Starbucks the world brand for the first time in the 1990s.

At the same time, it seems that Starbucks loses the ground with Gen Z, something he admitted in his latest profits, when I moved to the shocking The mobile phone only “Beck Ab” stores are designed for speed and transactions “without friction” that supposed to be the wild mint for an original digital generation. Its share in the market has decreased between the regiment from 67 % to 61 % over the past two years, representing four quarters of the declines, according to Consumer Edge.

Starbucks denies that they lost a traction with GEN-Z: During the last quarterly profit call, Niccol indicated that the value of the value of customers is at the highest levels of two years, driven by the gains between Gen Z and Milenilels who “make up half of our customer base.”

However, it can be said, like Many restaurant chainsStarbucks offend the generation. When seeing their social embarrassment and their preference for digital demand, the company has mistakenly assumed that it should activate its stores about these behaviors. But Nicole told the analysts in July that only coordination of the mobile phone was “excessive transactions and lacked warmth and human communication that determines our brand.”

But Gen Z, Niccol is betting, and gives up that the old Starbucks feels the same way90s summer child“

Some call it the name Al -Buhaidah A generation, they are attracted instead towards exotic local cafes that multiply the centers of society and cultural connotations – the type you will see in programs such as friends or how i met your mother, Consumer edge data appears.

Nicole believes that the answer is in the original Starbucks innovation for “third place”.

Restore this feeling of central mechanism

The idea of ​​”third place” comes from the book of the Urban Sociologist Ray Olnemporg for the year 1989 Wonderful good placeHe who argued that society needs to gather spots outside the home and work. Cafes, bars, gyms, nail salon – all of this.

Starbucks worked hard to vaccinate this term; His CEO was published in Time Oldenburg for the first time, Howard Schultz, often on radio programs and in the interviews that People assumed that he invented it.

“Starbucks was noticeable for spacious and comfortable sitting in the early days,” Karen Christinen, author and collaborator in Oldenburg, He said Coffee newsletter Pour. “It was the usual place to find a seat, Wi -Fi and electricity in a strange city, and a common place to meet friends.”

However, it was difficult to find this atmosphere in recent years. Stewings and receipt via mobile phone now Override Long visits to sitting, and six consecutive four -fourth sales of the store indicate that customers are not wandering. Nicole said in his note that the goal now is to return people.

He told employees: “Our goal is to provide every cafe for warm and wicked space with a wonderful atmosphere and seat for every occasion.”

The company says that the new investment will give priority to shops that can be reshaped to “existing spaces”.

Expect more ceramic cups, softer sitting, ports and plannings designed to slow customers instead of speeding them out of the door. Starbucks ended its financial year with about 18,300 sites throughout North America, but the growth of stores will not resume until 2026.

Once and the future “third place”

The price is very descending: Starbucks expect $ 150 million of separation costs and $ 850 million linked to closure and re -view. This announcement follows a former investment of $ 500 million in Parista hours through “Green apron service”

But labor tensions waved on the horizon. Starbucks United, which represents more than 12,000 Paristas said Request bargaining On the closure. The union leaders have warned of the discounts that undermine the Vepi Starbucks, the community that it wants to restore.

Beyond financial affairs, cultural risks. As Oldenburg argued, the third places are vital for social cohesion – where people of all types can rub the shoulders. In recent years, many third places have disappeared, which is the direction of the epidemic.

“The public entertainment space is crucial for society,” Professor Nuddam GWendolyn Purifoye He said The New York Times. “If you do not build places for gathering, this makes us more strange, and strange creates anxiety.”

(This story has been updated to include comments from Starbucks profits about its power to stay with Gen Z.)

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