Starbucks will no longer sell an Italian brand of baked goods at most of its high-end cafes — scrapping the beloved label introduced by the company’s former CEO Howard Schultz.
The Seattle-based coffee chain will phase out the Princi line of pastries and other baked goods from menus at its eight Roastery and Reserve locations in the US and China, according to an internal memo obtained by Bloomberg News.
There was no timeline given for the phase-out, which was decided by the company before Brian Niccol took over as CEO earlier this month, Bloomberg reported.
The Roastery and Reserve stores will continue to sell sandwiches, croissants and other food assortments that do not bear the Princi branding.
Princi is an Italian bakery and cafe brand that is known for its artisanal breads, pastries and other baked goods. With Starbucks as an investor, Princi opened stand-alone locations in New York, Seattle and Chicago.
In 2016, Starbucks, which was led by Schultz at the time, partnered with Princi to introduce its baked items at the chain’s Reserve Roasteries in New York, Seattle, Tokyo and Chicago.
The company opened its first standalone Princi bakery at the Seattle Reserve Roastery two years later.
Princi-branded items will be available for sale at 11 Starbucks Reserve locations in Tokyo as well as the Roastery in Milan.
“We look forward to continuing to offer customers at our Starbucks Reserve locations in the US the same menu of handcrafted, artisanal food made from high-quality ingredients and prepared daily by our chefs, as well as continuing to work with Princi in our Tokyo Roastery and Reserve locations, and our Milan Roastery,” Starbucks said in a statement to Nation’s Restaurant News.
The Brooklyn-born Schultz is credited with growing Starbucks from what was once a small chain of a handful of coffee shops in Seattle into a global behemoth that boasts more than 38,000 stores spanning 86 countries.
The executive said that the concept for Starbucks was inspired by his trips to Italy, where he observed coffee drinkers patronize espresso bars and was in awe of the country’s coffeehouse culture.
He had envisioned more than 1,000 stand-alone Princi stores as well as more than 1,000 Reserve stores — the high-end outlets that sell hard-to-get coffees, cocktails and dishes.
Schultz stepped down as Starbucks CEO three times, the last coming in March 2023, when he was replaced by Laxman Narasimhan.
But Narasimhan’s tenure was marred by sagging sales, declining profits and a lackluster performance by Starbucks stock — leading to the appointing of Niccol, whose resume includes successful stints in the C-suite at Taco Bell and Chipotle.
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