Starbucks Is Closing 250 Stores Across North America
Starbucks is closing about 250 coffeehouses across North America, but customers looking for a simple list of affected stores may have a hard time finding one. The company has not released a complete store-by-store list, leaving local reports, signs posted at coffeehouses, and changes to the Starbucks app to gradually reveal where the closures are happening.
The shutdown represents about 1% of Starbucks’ more than 18,000 North American coffeehouses and is expected to be largely completed by the end of the company’s 2026 fiscal year. According to Starbucks’ SEC filing, the company is closing locations that do not meet its expectations for the coffeehouse experience and financial performance.
The closures are spreading across the country
The scale of the shutdown is becoming clearer as individual locations disappear. SFGate identified 64 likely closures across California, while the Los Angeles Times found 36 likely locations in Southern California alone. The Times confirmed that all 36 had disappeared from the Starbucks app and were either marked permanently closed on Google or could not be reached by phone. Starbucks did not confirm the newspaper’s full list.
Closures are appearing well beyond California. Local outlets have reported affected stores in Colorado, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota, and other parts of the country as the wider picture continues to emerge.
For now, that means any nationwide list should be treated carefully. Starbucks has confirmed the approximate number of closures, but they have not published an official list identifying all 250 coffeehouses.
Starbucks is closing stores while sales are growing
The timing may seem unusual because Starbucks’ recent numbers do not point to a broad sales collapse. According to the company’s fiscal third-quarter results, global comparable-store sales rose 7.9% from a year earlier. North American comparable sales increased 8.1%, while transactions rose 4.5%. Revenue from the North American segment climbed 7% to about $7.4 billion.
Instead, the closures are part of CEO Brian Niccol’s ongoing “Back to Starbucks” strategy, which focuses on reviving the coffeehouse experience and improving the company’s store portfolio. Starbucks has been investing in stores and customer experience while reviewing locations that do not meet its financial or operational expectations.
That makes this closure round less about Starbucks abandoning growth and more about changing the makeup of their store network. The company says they still see significant long-term growth opportunities in North America and are actively developing a pipeline of new coffeehouses.
Closing 250 stores comes with a $300 million bill
The changes are not cheap. Starbucks expects approximately $300 million in restructuring charges related to the latest plan, according to their SEC filing. About $200 million will consist of cash charges primarily related to lease exits and employee separation benefits, while another $100 million will come from noncash charges tied to disposing of or writing down store assets.
The closures have also reduced Starbucks’ expansion forecast. The company previously expected 600 to 650 net new company-operated and licensed coffeehouses globally during fiscal 2026. They now expect about 440, with the roughly 250 North American closures partly offset by higher net new openings in international markets.
Employees are also affected. Starbucks says they will try to transfer workers from closing coffeehouses to other stores where possible and provide severance support to those who cannot be transferred.
The closures have also drawn attention from organized labor. Some unionized coffeehouses are among the affected locations. For example, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported that Oregon’s first unionized Starbucks, located on Willamette Street in Eugene, is among the stores being shut down.
This is Starbucks’ second major closure wave in a year
The latest cuts follow another major restructuring announced in September 2025. That plan involved hundreds of store closures across North America and Europe and was expected to cost Starbucks about $1 billion. PBS NewsHour reports that 627 stores ultimately closed in that round.
Taken together, the two rounds show Starbucks making significant changes to its physical footprint even as customer traffic and sales recover. The company is cutting locations that no longer meet its targets while investing in stores it believes have stronger prospects and continuing to plan new coffeehouses.
For customers, though, the immediate issue is much simpler. Starbucks still has not published an official list of all 250 affected coffeehouses. Until they do, some customers may only find out their neighborhood Starbucks is gone when the location disappears from the app or they arrive to find the doors closed.
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