Why did Starbucks invest in this bakery?

Starbucks founder Schultz: "they will be the best partners for our high-quality coffee."

Starbucks wants to solve the pain point of the past 20 years-the food is so bad.

I believe you and I who have patronized Starbucks have feelings. Anyway, every time I go back to Starbucks, after ordering a drink, I have to hesitate for a long time in front of that big glass cabinet, forget breakfast, and I can still deal with it by stuffing a sandwich into my mouth. Starbucks cake, which is nothing new and not fresh enough, affects the pleasant and cozy mood that afternoon tea is supposed to have.

Former Starbucks executives, including founder Howard Schultz, are well aware of this, not just as a customer. "Food is a problem they've been trying to solve for 20 years." John Moore, a former marketing executive at Starbucks and now chief operating officer of marketing consultancy Brainson Fire, said, "these stores are set up as coffee-making and coffee-drinking places, so there is no suitable backup space to prepare and do other work for serving such high-end desserts."

Howard Schultz himself admitted, "I think it's fair to say that our food is not much better than cardboard."

This pain point of Starbucks actually leaves a lot of room for its competitors.

Not to mention Europe, especially Italy-not to mention food, there is no way to conquer Italians in the coffee products that Starbucks has always been proud of. It is an accepted fact that Italians are the most coffee-savvy people in the world. I once asked an Italian friend of mine who was from the northern city of Verona. What do you think of Starbucks? "Starbucks? Can you call that coffee? "

In China, Korean cafes know more about Chinese stomachs than Starbucks. For example, in addition to having more choices than Starbucks in drinks, Man Coffee has much more delicious food, much hotter food and more choices than Starbucks.

However, Starbucks now has a sense of crisis in three aspects:

1. The consumption of coffee beans in the United States is growing slowly or even no longer growing.

It also means that American coffee consumption has grown slowly, as evidenced by import trade data collected by Panjiva.

"judging from the overall state of coffee imports over the past few years, the market seems to be quite mature," says Josh Green, CEO of Panju.com. "prices go up and down, but the growth of imports has been limited-in such markets, there are usually many companies that want to go high-end and upgrade in terms of price and product uniqueness."

This means that in the US market, Starbucks needs to make a layout in the beverage market other than high-end coffee and coffee.

So you can understand why Starbucks has made all kinds of investments and acquisitions since 2013. For example, in a suburb east of Los Angeles, a $70 million well-equipped cold-pressed juice factory has been built.

In addition, Starbucks spent a total of $750 million on three companies, namely Evolution Fresh Juice, La Boulange Brown Hot Bakery and Teavana Tea House.

Bronge provides delicious food to Starbucks' existing stores, while Evolution Fresh Juice and Teavana teahouses symbolize Starbucks' ambitions for drinks other than coffee.

And high-end coffee-in 2014, Starbucks launched an Starbucks Roastery in its hometown of Seattle. Does that sound familiar? Starbucks is about to open a Starbucks Roastery in Shanghai Taiguhui, which opens this year.

This brings us to Starbucks' second sense of crisis.

two。 Chinese consumers are growing fast, and coffee lovers educated by Starbucks may have abandoned Starbucks.

Of course, this sense of crisis is still very mild. As far as coffee consumption is concerned, China has lagged behind the US market for decades, and coffee consumption in China is still in its growing stage.

In the US market, Starbucks has seen a large number of consumers turning to boutique coffee chains such as Stamton Cafe (Stumptown Coffee Roasters), Delanos Coffee roasting Company (DillanosCoffee Roasters) and Blue Bottle Coffee Coffee. Starbucks Roastery is to compete directly with these boutique coffee chains that claim to offer unique coffee beans from special areas.

In China, Starbucks' position is not in jeopardy, but in view of the rapid changes in the needs of Chinese customers, the launch of high-end coffee shops such as Roastery is to meet the needs of those consumers who already know coffee; on the other hand, it can also feed Starbucks' regular stores and deepen their "coffee" brand image.

3. Now that the US market faces growth bottlenecks, in order to tell investors a credible growth story, in addition to the "second home market" of China, Starbucks has to conquer the European market.

How to conquer picky European consumers, especially the coffee kingdom of Italy? The answer is that coffee and food all take the high-end route, not rely on the fast food model to fool everyone's Starbucks Roastery. In 2017, Starbucks finally plucked up the courage to open its first store in Italy, Roastery.

You know, it was in Italy that Schultz got the inspiration to start Starbucks.

As you can see, Starbucks' three strategic demands all point to the same name: Starbucks Roastery. For Starbucks, which is a mass-oriented company, it has to extend to the high end and introduce food that it is not good at. What shall I do? Acquisition + cooperation.

So why did Starbucks choose this bakery / coffee shop / restaurant called Princi to be the exclusive food supplier to Starbucks Roastery? And invested in it?

Let's listen to Starbucks founder Howard Schultz explain why we chose Princi. "We haven't baked food in Starbucks stores in 45 years, and this unprecedented partnership will change all that." Rocco and his Princi team are passionate about artisanal and baked goods. They are not only committed to providing quality service to customers, but also focus on detail, improve the selection of recipes, and the ingenuity of the preparation process, will undoubtedly become the best partners for our high-quality coffee. "

On the other hand, Princi also has a need for global expansion (which is really not like a traditional Italian company). Rocco Princi, the founder of Princi, opened a branch in London outside the four principle stores in Italy, which is known as the "Armani of the Bakery" because of its success. (yes, Armani is also from Italy.)

Schultz is in Princi.

We visited Princi in Milan to see what Schultz called "craftsmanship and excellence".

The Princi we went to is located in a corner of Milan's new financial district, backed by Cuomo Avenue, a famous luxury street, and nearby is Garibaldi Station, Milan's second largest railway station.

The shop is open from 7 a.m. to 11:00 and continues to serve a wide range of freshly baked bread, pizza and desserts, which is rare in Italy, a country where all shops are closed at 7 p.m. In addition, Italians are more accustomed to drinking an one-euro espresso and eating a croissant (croissant) standing up in the small dark cafes that can be seen everywhere on the street (called "bar" in Italian, but not the same as bars).

Princi initially focused on high-quality handmade bread

But at Princi, you can sit down for coffee and bread, which is more American, or, to put it more bluntly, from Starbucks.

Each Princi store has its own unique decoration style and characteristics according to its location. For example, the first Princi, located near Milan Cathedral, was designed and rebuilt by Milan architect Claudio Silvestrin in 2006. The walls and floors of the city are stacked with clear geometric lines of sand porphyry similar to flour color, giving people entering the door a sense of romantic church solemnity that fits with nearby attractions. Does that sound like Starbucks? No wonder the two families hit it off.

The architect's design is inspired by the elements needed to bake bread: water, air, land and fire. There are three scattered square tables that are also sand porphyry pillars for people to stand by and eat.

The narrow but unobstructed interior of the store

The small stone table in Princi can only serve as food for standing up.

The bread-themed wall wall at the door

Compact entrance to Princi

Located in the most expensive part of Milan, the Princi occupies a small area, with only a row of indoor seats close to the wall and a separate table outside the door. But under the ingenious use of Silverstrin, the transparent glass window makes the whole space look bigger, and through the glass can have a panoramic view of the food in the store, but also more attractive to enter.

In summer, according to the local custom, everyone likes to eat outdoors and bask in the sun, and Princi customers are no exception.

Upon entering the store, in addition to being attracted by a wide variety of food, it is impossible to ignore the unique aroma of fresh toast in Princi. Princi now has a wide variety of food, including fresh handmade bread, wooden oven-baked pizza and Focaccia, fresh coffee desserts, Fresh Juice, wine and simple meat appetizers.

Croissant, the breakfast routine

To order at Princi, you need to go to the cashier (which also looks like Starbucks). But unlike an American coffee shop, there will be attentive waiters to help you put your coffee and snacks on your seat.

It's better than pizza, Forkasha.

The price of Princi is not so cute, you can even understand it as a kind of "light extravagant bread". A small margarita pizza costs 5 to 6 euros in an ordinary restaurant in Milan, while it costs 9 euros in Princi. A Sicilian Cannolo costs 5 euros-such a pastry costs about 3 euros in a dessert shop.

Because of his reputation, Pope Francisco also ate Princi margarita pizza when he visited Milan in 2014.

Where does such fame come from? The key person is Rocco Princi, the founder of Princi.

Rocco Princi, founder of Princi of the same name

RoccoPrinci, who comes from a poor family in the poor Calabria region of southern Italy, has done heavy work such as picking oranges and carrying oranges since he was a boy. But since he came to Milan and began to learn to make bread, he felt from the bottom of his heart that this was a profession he was destined to do from birth.

In 1986, RoccoPrinci opened its first Princi bakery in an alley in the city center just 300m from Milan Cathedral. Princi is the plural of "Prince" in Italian. In Rocco's opinion, bread is the prince of all food. And he treats bread in this way: natural yeast, spring water, organic flour and salt, and even burning wood uses only European beech trees. (well, knowing this, you can also understand why Princi bread is so expensive.)

Princi's bread.

Rocco also expressed his concern for people: "I want to hire people who have a sincere passion for bread-they always wear smiles on their faces so that our customers have a prince-like experience." How's it going? Is it very similar to the "partner" that Schultz often talks about? At Starbucks, employees are all called "Partner". The two companies share the same values of "people".

Bread is delicious, natural, word of mouth, so that Princi soon gathered the first batch of loyal customers in Milan. But the great thing about Rocco Princi is that he is not only an excellent craftsman, but also an excellent businessman.

The masters who are preparing for Fresh Juice

He soon realized that selling bread alone could attract a limited number of guests. And, as Schultz is thinking, since you rent a storefront, why not make full use of all your opening time? Why not make a seamless breakfast, lunch and dinner, all freshly baked at home, and can sit down to eat in the "bakery"? In this way, the efficiency of the turf can be greatly improved and the rent-to-sale ratio will be reduced. For those who do not leave as soon as they sit down, but also because they have more choices, the unit price can also be increased.

The concept was too advanced in Italy in the last century: in Italy, traditional bakeries (panificio) did not sell desserts or coffee, and dessert shops (pasticeria) did not sell bread, and neither of them offered a meal service. If you want to sit down and chat and have coffee, you need to go to bar (more similar to domestic coffee shops), but bar usually buys from suppliers, the food is not fresh, and it is dark and narrow, and the tables and chairs are old and uncomfortable.

As a result, Princi evolved into an one-stop gourmet experience, ranging from a leisurely Italian breakfast with coffee and croissant at 08:00, to afternoon tea, to Spritz cocktails with ham appetizers before dinner.