Enjoy Your Starbucks at Home!

Minjun Son

One of the most popular franchise coffee shop in Korea and the world, obviously, Starbucks is coming to your home! Starbucks Korea is planning to expand the service after selecting multiple pilot stores within this year and starting testing.

The number one coffee shop in Korea, the only large coffee brand that did not provide delivery service, eventually entered the delivery service with the expansion of the untact (a combination of the prefix ‘un’ and the word ‘contact’ – has been coined in Korea to describe a contactless world) consumption trend due to COVID-19. Therefore, competition for coffee delivery in the industry is expected to become even more intense. 

Starbucks Korea plans to start a delivery service by selecting several stores including downtown Seoul as demonstration stores by the end of this year. The stores have not been confirmed yet, but it is planning to determine suitable stores by comprehensively judging the population density and commercial districts.

It is expected that delivery agency delivers coffee when a customer places an order with Starbucks’ own ordering application, Siren order. Therefore, Starbucks is in negotiation with delivery agencies and plans to select a partner in the near future. Large delivery companies such as Baedal-ui Minjok (배달의민족) and Yogiyo (요기요) are also subject to consideration, however, it is known that the priority is somewhat lowered due to problems such as fees and conflicts with siren orders. Previously, Q&People, a software developer and a Starbucks partner, also hired personnel related to delivery software.

Starbucks plans to expand the delivery service in earnest from next year if they reach certain satisfactory level in terms of consumer response and coffee quality maintenance after piloting the delivery service. Starbucks was reluctant to introduce delivery service due to difficulty of maintaining the quality and possibility of changes in the taste and aroma during delivery. However, it is known that this policy has been revised recently as the increasing expansion of delivery market has reached a level that is hard to ignore anymore. In addition, the successive introduction of coffee delivery service by Starbucks overseas, such as the United States, China, and the United Kingdom, also affected.

Thus, as Starbucks enters the delivery business, competition among coffee shops is expected to intensify as other domestic brands are competitively expanding their delivery services.