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Starbucks is going back to the future.
The coffee giant is brewing up big changes, bringing back old-school self-serve stations and comfy seats to its stores amid sluggish sales numbers.
Starbucks scrapped the stations, which had milk, sugar, sweeteners, spices and stirrers, during the COVID pandemic, leaving extra labor for busy baristas and slowing down service time.
Now, new CEO Brian Niccol — who took the helm back in September — is reimplementing the self-service stations that customers have been wanting back for years.
“Remember when we used to pour our own milk in Starbucks? I miss those days,” one patron wrote nostalgically on X earlier this month.
“When Starbucks closed condiment bars during COVID, the customization work shifted to the baristas behind the counter,” David Garfield, the global head of industries at consulting firm AlixPartners, told CNN. “This caused delays.”
By early 2025, all Starbucks locations will have self-serving stations again in an attempt to take the load off the baristas — which seems to be part of a bigger theme for the chain, acknowledging that Starbucks overloaded baristas with endless different ways to prepare one drink.
“Our goal is to ensure that our baristas have time to provide not only great craft drinks, but also hospitality,” a Starbucks spokesperson said, per CNN.
“We’re going to bring back the coffee condiment bar because both our customers are asking for it and our baristas are saying it would help them deliver the speed of service that they want to provide,” new CEO Brian Niccol said.
Adding self-serving stations is just one of the ways Starbucks is taking the heat off baristas.
When Niccol took over the chain Sept. 9, he noted that one of his priorities to accelerate growth at the company is to simplify the “overly complex” menu so baristas can speed up service.
Menu items being booted include Starbucks’ olive oil-infused drinks, which were only around for one year. These controversial drinks left the menu officially on Nov. 7.
The company is also bringing back Sharpies, having baristas handwrite customers’ names on their drinks.
They’ll also bring back comfy chairs to some of its stores, further giving some Starbucks outlets an old-school vibe, where customers can sit for hours relaxing or doing remote work.
