Starbucks to close about 250 North American cafes, take $300 million in charges and cut openings to 440

Starbucks (SBUX) will close about 250 underperforming coffeehouses in North America, roughly 1% of its more than 18,000 locations there, and expects about $300 million in restructuring charges, the company said in an 8-K filed Thursday. The board approved the move on Sept. 22 as part of chief executive Brian Niccol's "Back to Starbucks" plan. It is the second round of North American closures during Niccol's two years in the job, CNBC reported.

Chief operating officer Mike Grams told employees the company had picked stores where it could not "consistently deliver the experience we want" or saw no "path to acceptable financial performance," according to the letter quoted by CNBC and Fox Business. Starbucks has not said where the closing cafes are. Most will shut before its fiscal year ends later this month.

What a closed cafe costs Starbucks

The filing splits the $300 million into about $200 million of cash, mainly for exiting leases early and paying severance, and about $100 million of non-cash write-downs of store equipment and fit-outs. Spread across 250 stores, that is about $1.2 million per closure, of which roughly $800,000 is cash, by our arithmetic. Those are averages, and the real spread will be wide: a store with years left on its lease costs far more to walk away from than one near the end of its term.

The number matters because it shows how weak these stores must be. A company willing to pay close to $1 million in cash per location to leave is saying the alternative, keeping them open for the rest of their leases, would cost more.

The growth number moved more than the closure count

Starbucks now expects about 440 net new company-operated and licensed openings worldwide in fiscal 2026, down from its prior guidance of 600 to 650. If the 250 closures were the only change, the new figure would be 350 to 400. The filing says higher international openings partly offset the closures, which implies roughly 40 to 90 more cafes abroad than previously planned, our calculation. North America is, for now, shrinking while growth comes from elsewhere, although the company said it still sees a "significant longer-term growth opportunity" in the region.

The stock barely moved on the news. It was at $94.52 in premarket trading at 8:52 a.m., up 0.4% from Wednesday's $94.14 close, according to Nasdaq.

Who notices on the street

For independent coffee shops, a Starbucks closing nearby is one of the few pieces of good news that arrives without warning: a morning crowd that has to go somewhere else.

CheckThisBiz, a directory of 7.7 million independent US businesses with chains and franchises excluded, lists 68,064 independent coffee shops, the most in California (8,628), New York (4,916) and Texas (4,701). Those are the owner-operated shops most likely to be down the street from a closing Starbucks.

Two practical points follow. First, the list of closures is not public, so the owner who benefits will usually find out from the paper sign on the door, not from a filing. Second, a closed Starbucks leaves a built-out cafe space with plumbing, venting and a drive-thru in some cases. Landlords who suddenly have one to fill may be more flexible on rent and fit-out than usual, which is worth knowing for an operator looking at a second site. Our restaurant playbook covers how independent food businesses run the numbers on a new location.

Sources: Starbucks 8-K (SEC); CNBC; Fox Business; Nasdaq quotes. Per-store costs and the implied international change are our calculations. This is market information, not investment advice.