Starbucks to open premium concept café in Shanghai

In 1998, Reuters reported that Starbucks announced “it will open its first stores in China next year, hoping to wean Chinese off their traditional jars of green tea.” Many pundits scoffed that changing the habits of a nation of tea drinkers was a fool’s errand.

• Today, Starbucks has more than 3,000 stores in China, and revenues from China are the brightest spot of the company’s financial reports.
• Caixin reports that the company “will open a Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Shanghai, the first of the new concept cafes outside its home turf, reflecting the company’s confidence in its fastest growing market.”
• Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson told Caixin that the company has “over 5 million customer occasions a week in China,” of 95 million customer visits a week globally.

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