Picture from here

Starbucks is closing 600 stores and laying off 12,000 people according to Reuters reporting. Is this really a problem? From the unemployment we may notice it, but from access to upper-class yuppie coffee will we? I read yesterday that someone in Portland, OR had 23 stores within 2 miles of their house. This guy has 43 within 5 miles and reports the highest density they have found is 170 stores around Broadway Ave in New York City.

When I was growing up I thought a McDonald’s at every other exit on the highway was dense growth for a store or business. Now that may as well be freaking no man’s land as far as Starbucks is concerned. If you cut down half of all the stores around the three locations I mentioned earlier – that is 110 stores right there, so 1/6 of the number of stores to close and that will still leave an insane amount of density for those residents. Don’t expect me to pity you if you have to walk another 100 yards because the Starbucks closest to you is closed. It does mean however you are a bad person that didn’t frequent your closest Starbucks enough to they decided you weren’t worth sticking around for to deliver coffee goodness to – remember that when you walk that extra 3 minutes.

I once read that they could build a Walmart five miles from another Walmart and both would still be profitable. I think in the old Starbucks regime is that they could build a new Starbucks five feet from another Starbucks and still be profitable. It seems that old thinking was wrong and now all Starbucks must be a minimum of 15.3 feet from one another.