Starbucks CEO Narasimhan says China mainland store count unchanged

63
1
Starbucks CEO Narasimhan says China mainland store count unchanged

This file photo, taken on January 30, 2020, shows a woman walking past a Starbucks coffee shop in Beijing, China. On Tuesday, Starbucks' new global CEO, Laxman Narasimhan, highlighted China's huge market potential and suggested the company's goal of opening 9,000 stores on China-based China mainland by 2025 remained unchanged.

China's per capita coffee consumption is increasing but still far behind Japan and the United States, Narasimhan said during his visit to Shanghai, where more than 1,000 Starbucks stores are located.

Starbucks' presence in China has grown with a surge in ticket sales, as a result of an increase in the store count.

In 1999, the US coffee giant opened its first shop on the Chinese mainland. As of April 2, it operated over 8,200 stores in 244 cities across the Chinese mainland.

Despite the impact of COVID-19, the company said it plans to increase its store count on the Chinese mainland to 9,000 by 2025.