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Cafe Hawaii Partners Starbucks Coffee Co. has chosen Cafe Hawaii Partners to work with its international division to launch the ubiquitous brand in Puerto Rico.
heads east
The local Starbucks licensee
looks to another island,
Puerto Rico, for growthBy Erika Engle
eengle@starbulletin.comNew entities have been created for the expansion, which includes the opening of 10 to 15 Starbucks locations in 18 to 24 months. Cafe Hawaii Partners has created Puerto Rico Coffee Partners, which will team with Starbucks Latin America to open the stores under a joint venture named Cafe del Caribe. Its first store is to open in San Juan by the end of this summer.
"We are very excited to bring Starbucks to a market such as Puerto Rico, which has a strong coffee heritage and coffee drinking tradition," said Cafe del Caribe Chief Executive Officer Dean McPhail.
The expansion represents a huge opportunity for Hawaii-based Cafe Hawaii Partners and its Hawaii employees, according to President Greg Meier, but it's not the first time they've gone out of state.
McPhail established JJC Florida LLC to expand the partners' Jamba Juice operations, and it's a simple hop, skip and jump to Puerto Rico from there, Meier said.
With few exceptions Starbucks locations on the mainland are corporate-owned and not franchised. That sent the partners to Puerto Rico in their continuing effort to grow their business, Meier said.
Each had been to Puerto Rico before; each had noticed similarities to the way things are done in Hawaii, he said.
Gordy Thompson, who opened the first Hawaii Starbucks in Kahala Mall five years ago, is now director of operations for the company in Puerto Rico. He's learning Spanish as he goes, but Meier says, "It's a dual-language country. Spanish is more prevalent, but English is pervasive throughout the country. Pretty much everybody speaks it."
There are U.S.-based companies doing business in Puerto Rico who don't speak Spanish, Meier said.
The company owns and operates 28 Starbucks locations and 11 Jamba Juice stores in Hawaii, which employ 1,000 people; as well as the 7 Jamba Juice locations in Florida.
In Puerto Rico, an estimated 75 permanent jobs will be created, while construction and related activities will create temporary work.
"The exciting thing for us is it all started here," Meier said, "This is where our infrastructure is."
The main corporate office is still here which will handle back office functions for the Puerto Rico operations including payables, payroll and training programs among other functions, Meier said.
Cafe Hawaii Partners is not done expanding locally either, even though conventional business wisdom counsels against expanding too rapidly.
"I think with us the customer demand has been very strong and we kind of like to listen to our customers and expand as they're asking for it."
Three new Starbucks will open this spring at Lahaina Cannery Mall on Maui, Parker Ranch Center on the Big Island and in Aiea Shopping Center on Oahu. At the latter location, a Jamba Juice will open as well.
Publicly traded Starbucks and privately owned Jamba Juice are not connected at the corporate level, although they do share a few common members on their boards of directors, Meier said.
None of Hawaii's Starbucks offer drive-through service, as do some "full stores" on the mainland, but it is something the partners have explored, "I think if we found the right opportunity we would definitely be interested in trying it here," Meier said.
Starbucks Coffee Co. is also planning expansion to Germany, Spain and Greece. It operates more than 5,000 retail locations worldwide.