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Business|Starbucks to Lay Off 1,100 Corporate Employees Amid Sluggish Sales
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/24/business/starbucks-layoffs.html
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The jobs cuts, which will affect about 7 percent of the chain’s non-retail staff, are part of its new chief executive’s plan to win back customers.
Feb. 24, 2025, 11:47 a.m. ET
Starbucks is laying off 1,100 corporate employees, its chief executive said in a letter to workers on Monday, marking the coffee chain’s latest move to restructure amid lackluster sales.
Brian Niccol, who took over as chief executive last fall, has vowed to woo back customers who have shied away from $8 lattes and long wait times, which have put pressure on sales in recent months. Same-store sales globally slipped 4 percent in the first quarter of the company’s 2025 fiscal year, which ended on Dec. 29. The layoffs, Mr. Niccol said in the letter, are aimed at allowing Starbucks to “operate more efficiently” and “reduce complexity.”
The cuts will affect nearly 7 percent of the company’s 16,000 employees who work outside company-owned stores; baristas are not included. Starbucks had indicated in January that it planned to cut corporate jobs.
“We believe it’s a necessary change to position Starbucks for future success,” Mr. Niccol said in his note. The company, he said, will also scrap several hundred open and unfilled positions.
Shares of Starbucks rose more than 1 percent on Monday morning.
The move comes amid Mr. Niccol’s efforts to rethink the in-store experience for customers and streamline the business, part of his pledge to bring back the more personal coffeehouse atmosphere for which Starbucks was originally known. He has called for changes to the mobile ordering systems to address surges in orders, and has cut some items from Starbucks’ menu. The company also announced that it would not increase prices for the 2025 fiscal year.
Last month, Mr. Niccol shook up the chain’s leadership in North America, a market that accounts for about three-quarters of its revenue. Mike Grams, formerly the president and chief operating officer of Taco Bell, and Meredith Sandland, who was chief executive of Empower Delivery, a restaurant software company, were named to two new roles overseeing store performance, development and design.
