Customised coffee orders are holding up the line at Starbucks. Unicorn Frappuccinos and Iced Vanilla Chais with Matcha Sweet Cream Cold Foam take longer to pour than a medium roast. Starbucks believes the answer to its falling sales is to add even more choices to the menu. This is a problem.
The Seattle-based coffee giant this month delivered a train wreck set of quarterly results. Same-store sales fell despite higher menu prices. The company took the axe to its full-year guidance for the second time this year. The stock shed nearly a fifth of its value within a week of results being published.
Laxman Narasimhan, who took over as chief executive just over a year ago, blames long wait times and price-conscious consumers in Starbucks’s biggest markets — the US and China — for the ugly numbers.