Starbucks buys luxury tea brand
Starbucks has bought Teavana, a luxury tea house chain in the US, in a bid to expand its business beyond coffee and grow the tea market.
The $620m deal will see Starbucks acquire Teavana’s 300-strong chain of tea stores.
Teavana sells a range of high end and exotic loose leaf teas within shopping malls across the US.
Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz told Reuters that he hopes to replicate the success of its coffee shops and “do for tea what we did for coffee.”
Starbucks already owns the Tazo tea brand and has previously outlined plans to grow its presence as a standalone brand. The first Tazo tea bar will open in Chicago this week and act as a “laboratory” for Teavana, Schultz told Reuters.
Schultz plans to open additional Teavana stores in the US and abroad but it is not yet known whether the Teavana brand will come to the UK. Starbucks will also add tea bars that sell prepared drinks within Teavana stores and develop a range of Teavana branded packaged products.
Starbucks acquired a fresh juice company earlier this year and plans to open a chain of juice bars.
The company is embroiled in a tax avoidance row along with other companies in the UK after it was revealed that it has paid no corporation tax in the UK since 2009.
