Starbucks is a multinational coffee chain headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It was founded by Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gordon Bowker in 1971. From a single and very humble bean roasting store in Pike Place Market, the company is now a global giant operating over 37,711 stores around the world. This large global footprint obviously increases the competition for Starbucks in many different markets. The coffee industry itself is also highly competitive, with established players including McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts.
A global coffee and doughnut chain that offers a range of coffee beverages, doughnuts, and breakfast items. Dunkin’ competes with Starbucks in the coffee and quick-service restaurant market.
Dunkin’ provides a variety of coffee beverages, doughnuts, and breakfast options, focusing on convenience and affordability.
Both operate in the coffee and quick-service restaurant market, competing for coffee-loving customers and breakfast seekers.
Dunkin’s emphasis on doughnuts and breakfast items, as well as its value-oriented approach.
McDonald’s
A multinational fast-food chain that offers coffee, including specialty coffee beverages, along with a range of breakfast and snack items. McDonald’s competes with Starbucks in the coffee and fast-food market.
McDonald’s serves coffee beverages, breakfast items, and snacks, with a strong emphasis on affordability and convenience.
Both compete in the coffee market, with McDonald’s offering specialty coffee beverages and a diverse menu for breakfast and snacks.
McDonald’s focus on affordability and its extensive global presence.
Costa Coffee
A British multinational coffeehouse chain known for its coffee, sandwiches, and pastries. Costa Coffee competes with Starbucks in the coffeehouse and specialty coffee market.
Costa Coffee offers a wide range of coffee beverages, sandwiches, and baked goods, with a focus on quality and sustainability.
Both operate in the coffeehouse and specialty coffee market, providing coffee, snacks, and a café experience to customers.
Costa Coffee’s emphasis on quality and sustainability, as well as its European heritage.
Tim Hortons
A Canadian fast-food restaurant chain known for its coffee, doughnuts, and breakfast items. Tim Hortons competes with Starbucks in the coffee and quick-service restaurant market.
Tim Hortons offers coffee, doughnuts, and breakfast options, with a focus on Canadian hospitality and affordability.
Both operate in the coffee and quick-service restaurant market, serving coffee and breakfast items to customers.
Tim Hortons’ Canadian heritage and its emphasis on affordable coffee and breakfast.
Peet’s Coffee
An American specialty coffee roaster and retailer known for its premium coffee beans and coffeehouse locations. Peet’s Coffee competes with Starbucks in the specialty coffee and coffeehouse market.
Peet’s Coffee offers high-quality coffee beans, specialty coffee beverages, and a café experience with a focus on craftsmanship.
Both operate in the specialty coffee and coffeehouse market, providing premium coffee and café atmospheres to customers.
Peet’s Coffee’s reputation for premium coffee beans and its artisanal approach to coffee.
The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf
A global chain of coffee shops known for its coffee, tea, and specialty beverages. The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf competes with Starbucks in the specialty coffee and café market.
The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf offers a variety of coffee, tea, and specialty drinks, with a focus on global flavors and relaxation.
Both operate in the specialty coffee and café market, providing a range of coffee and tea options in a café setting.
The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf’s focus on global flavors and relaxation in its café experience.
Panera Bread
A fast-casual restaurant chain that offers a range of bakery items, sandwiches, salads, and coffee beverages. Panera Bread competes with Starbucks in the coffee and fast-casual dining market.
Panera Bread provides coffee, bakery items, and a menu of soups, sandwiches, and salads, with an emphasis on healthy and fresh ingredients.
Both compete in the coffee and fast-casual dining market, offering coffee and a menu of food items to customers.
Panera Bread’s focus on fresh and healthy food options in addition to coffee.
Café Nero
A European coffeehouse chain known for its coffee, pastries, and sandwiches. Café Nero competes with Starbucks in the coffeehouse and specialty coffee market.
Café Nero offers a variety of coffee beverages, pastries, and sandwiches, with a European café experience and a commitment to quality.
Both operate in the coffeehouse and specialty coffee market, providing coffee, snacks, and a café ambiance to customers.
Café Nero’s European heritage and its commitment to quality coffee.
Krispy Kreme
An American doughnut and coffeehouse chain known for its doughnuts and coffee beverages. Krispy Kreme competes with Starbucks in the coffee and doughnut market.
Krispy Kreme offers a range of doughnuts, coffee beverages, and specialty drinks, focusing on sweet treats and coffee pairings.
Both compete in the coffee and doughnut market, offering coffee beverages and doughnuts to customers.
Krispy Kreme’s reputation for freshly made doughnuts and sweet indulgence.
Seattle’s Best Coffee
A coffee brand and coffeehouse chain known for its coffee beans and coffee beverages. Seattle’s Best Coffee competes with Starbucks in the coffee and specialty coffee market.
Seattle’s Best Coffee provides premium coffee beans and coffee beverages, with an emphasis on quality and flavor profiles.
Both operate in the coffee and specialty coffee market, offering coffee and café experiences to customers.
Seattle’s Best Coffee’s reputation for premium coffee beans and flavor variety.
Starbucks is a retail company that sells beverages (primarily consisting of coffee-related drinks) and food. In 2023, Starbucks had 44% of company-operated stores vs. 56% of licensed stores which might make you think Starbucks is a franchise business, when in reality most of its revenue (nearly 82% in 2023) came from company-operated stores, thus making Starbucks a chain business model.
McDonald’s
McDonald’s may not be the first brand people associate with good coffee, but the company has made significant progress in the quality of its product offering through the McCafé chain.
The first such store opened in Australia in 1993, with more than 15,000 McDonald’s restaurants now serving hot and cold coffee-related beverages with premium beans. In terms of the number of stores opened, McDonald’s is the primary Starbucks competitor. Its competitiveness is further strengthened because the company can leverage its existing restaurant infrastructure to serve coffee.
In 2014, McDonald’s also started selling a range of coffee pods to compete with similar Starbucks products.
McDonald’s is a heavy-franchised business model. In 2022, over 60% of the total revenues came from franchised restaurants. The company’s long-term goal is to transition toward 95% of franchised restaurants (by 2022, franchised restaurants were 94.7% of the total). The company generated over $23 billion in revenues in 2022, of which $8.75 billion was from owned restaurants and $14.1 billion from franchised restaurants.
Dunkin’ Donuts
Dunkin’ Donuts is an American multinational coffee and doughnut company founded in 1950 by William Rosenberg. The company operates in almost 13,000 locations across 42 countries.
Although the company moved away from marketing itself as a coffee chain in the 90s, it introduced a specialty coffee line a decade later. Dunkin’ Donuts then launched its “American Runs on Dunkin'” advertising campaign, promoting itself as an All-American brand for the average consumer.
In addition to coffee and donuts, the chain also sells sandwiches, frozen beverages, bagels, and tea.
Costa Coffee
Costa Coffee is a major European competitor of Starbucks, with over 2,000 stores in the United Kingdom alone. Furthermore, the company operates over 6,000 Costa Express vending machine facilities.
Realizing its potential in non-North American markets, The Coca-Cola Company acquired Costa Coffee in 2019 for £3.9 billion. Ultimately, this gave the beverage giant a strong foothold in coffee and related products across parts of Europe, Africa, Asia Pacific, and the Middle East.
Tim Hortons
In terms of value for money, not many coffee chain companies can compete with the Canadian brand Tim Hortons. Starbucks is no exception.
Tim Hortons was founded in 1964 by former professional ice hockey player Tim Horton together with Jim Charade. The chain is a Canadian institution, with almost 5,000 quick-service restaurants in 14 countries.
The company offers a range of products, including muffins, cookies, pastries, bagels, and Greek yogurt with mixed berries. It also sells products under the Tims at Home banner, encompassing everyday essentials such as instant tea and coffee, hot chocolate, soup, and granola bars.
Key takeaways:
Starbucks is a multinational coffee chain operating over 33,000 stores worldwide. Competitive pressures are a direct result of the company’s global reach and also the nature of the industry it operates in.
Starbucks faces strong competition from McDonald’s, a company with a similarly large network of global franchises. Using existing infrastructure, many of these franchises sell premium coffee products through a McCafé store.
Dunkin’ Donuts and Tim Hortons are also significant Starbucks competitors in the North American market. In Europe and elsewhere, Costa Coffee is leveraging the power of parent company Coca-Cola to establish a strong presence.
Key Competitors of Starbucks:
McDonald’s:
McDonald’s has made progress in coffee quality through its McCafé chain.
Serves hot and cold coffee beverages with premium beans in over 15,000 restaurants globally.
Utilizes existing restaurant infrastructure to serve coffee products.
Over 56% of total revenues come from franchised restaurants.
Dunkin’ Donuts:
Offers coffee and doughnuts in nearly 13,000 locations across 42 countries.
Introduced a specialty coffee line and promotes itself as an All-American brand.
Sells sandwiches, frozen beverages, bagels, and tea in addition to coffee and doughnuts.
Costa Coffee:
Major European competitor with over 2,000 stores in the UK and 6,000 Costa Express vending machines.
Acquired by The Coca-Cola Company in 2019, expanding its presence across Europe, Africa, Asia Pacific, and the Middle East.
Tim Hortons:
Founded in Canada in 1964, offering value-for-money products.
Operates nearly 5,000 quick-service restaurants in 14 countries.
Provides a range of products including muffins, cookies, pastries, bagels, and beverages.
Starbucks’ main individual shareholder is Howard Schultz, the founder of Starbucks. Major institutional shareholders comprise BlackRock, with 7.18%, and The Vanguard Group, with 8.6% ownership. Starbucks follows a heavy-chained business model, where the company-operated stores play a critical role in the company’s long-term strategy, compared to McDonald’s heavy-franchised business model, where the long-term plan is to have over 95% of the stores as franchising.
Starbucks is a retail company that sells beverages (primarily consisting of coffee-related drinks) and food. In 2023, Starbucks had 44% of company-operated stores vs. 56% of licensed stores which might make you think Starbucks is a franchise business, when in reality most of its revenue (nearly 82% in 2023) came from company-operated stores, thus making Starbucks a chain business model.
Starbucks follows a chain business model strategy, where most of its revenue comes from its owned stores. For instance, in 2023, with nearly $36 billion in revenue, most of the revenue came from owned stores ($29.46 billion) compared to franchised stores ($4.51 billion) and other revenue sources ($2 billion). Yet owned stores have higher operational costs compared to franchised stores.
Starbucks follows a chain business model, building its brand through its owned stores. And its owned stores are also where most of the revenue is generated. In addition, the owned stores are a great asset to keep experimenting with new products while maintaining tight control over the customer experience.
In 2023, Starbucks operated 19,592vs. 18,253 licensed stores. Starbucks leverages primarily company-operated stores to keep tight control over product development, branding, distribution, and customer experience. It also leverages licensed stores for better amplification of brand, revenue, and profits.
Starbucks made 60% of its revenue, in 2023, from beverages, followed by other revenue, which accounted for 22% of the total revenue (that comprises packaged and single-serve coffees and teas, plus royalty and licensing revenues, beverage-related ingredients, serve ware, and ready-to-drink beverages, among other items.) and food, which accounted for 18% of the total sales in 2023.
Starbucks’s mission is “to inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.” And its vision is to “treat people like family, and they will be loyal and give their all.”
Starbucks is a multinational coffee chain headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It was founded by Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gordon Bowker in 1971. From a single and very humble bean roasting store in Pike Place Market, the company is now a global giant operating over 37,711 stores around the world. This large global footprint obviously increases the competition for Starbucks in many different markets. The coffee industry itself is also highly competitive, with established players including McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts.
Starbucks follows a matrix organizational structure with a combination of vertical and horizontal structures. It is characterized by multiple overlapping chains of command and divisions.
McDonald’s and Starbucks sit in the opposite spectrum of retail business models. Indeed, whereas McDonald’s follows a heavily franchised business model, Starbucks follows a heavy-chained one.
Starbucks highlights its mission as “to inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.” And its vision is to “treat people like family, and they will be loyal and give their all.”
Starbucks is a global consumer brand with direct distribution, recognized brands, and products that make it a viable business. Its reliance on the Americas as a primary operating segment makes it a weakness. At the same time, Starbucks faces risks related to coffee beans price volatility. Yet the company still has global expansion opportunities.
Zoominfo is an American software-as-a-service (SaaS) company founded by Henry Schuck and Kirk Brown in 2007. The company sells access to the most comprehensive B2B database in the world to help sales and marketing teams better communicate with prospects. Zoominfo held an IPO in June 2020 raising $935 million. Like similar software companies that are valuable to remote teams, demand for the Zoominfo platform increased because of the coronavirus pandemic. It is now used by over 20,000 businesses, with clients including T-Mobile, Zoom, Amazon, and Google.
Spotify is the world’s largest music streaming platform with over 381 million users across 184 markets around the world. The company was founded by Martin Lorentzon and Daniel Ek in 2008 in response to the shutdown of peer-to-peer music service Napster. Spotify became a success because it was the first company to determine how to distribute music legally and compensate the music industry at the same time. The platform now offers various curated music discovery services, music stations, audio customization, and private listening. In recent times, it has also ventured into the streaming of audiobooks, podcasts, comedy, poetry, and short stories.
Poshmark is a social commerce marketplace where users can buy and sell new or used clothing. The company was founded in 2011 by Manish Chandra, Tracy Sun, Gautam Golwala, and Chetan Pungaliya. Poshmark is one of many companies looking to profit from the explosive growth in the second-hand clothing and resale industry, which is expected to be worth around $51 billion by 2023. Scores of women, in particular, are opting to sell their unwanted fashion items online instead of donating them to charity or thrift stores.
Afterpay is an Australian fintech company operating in Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and the United States. Founded in 2014 by Nick Molnar and Anthony Eisen, the company enjoyed a first-mover advantage in the buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) space. Less than seven years later, the company reached 13.1 million active customers with gross sales amounting to $10.1 billion. Despite its success, some suggest the company has lost its edge in the buy-now-pay-later space with the emergence of several high-profile competitors exerting their influence and giving merchants more choice.
Carvana is an online used car retailer with vending machines located around the United States. The company was founded in 2012 by Ryan Keeton, Ben Huston, and Ernest Garcia III. The company is the fastest growing online used car retailer in North America and was recently one of the youngest companies to be added to the Fortune 500 list. While Carvana is currently the only American company selling cars in vending machines, its growth and success have not gone unnoticed by other players. In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the company’s major competitors.
Carvana is an online used car retailer with vending machines located around the United States. The company was founded in 2012 by Ryan Keeton, Ben Huston, and Ernest Garcia III. The company is the fastest growing online used car retailer in North America and was recently one of the youngest companies to be added to the Fortune 500 list. While Carvana is currently the only American company selling cars in vending machines, its growth and success have not gone unnoticed by other players. In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the company’s major competitors.
GoodRx is an American healthcare company known for its telemedicine platform and a website and mobile app that track prescription drug prices. As part of this service, the company makes drug coupons available for free to consumers. GoodRx was created by Trevor Bezdek, Doug Hirsch, and Scott Marlette. Hirsch, an early employee at both Yahoo and Facebook, got the idea for the company after picking up a prescription with private health insurance and still having to pay $450. Given the high variability in prices between different pharmacies, Hirsh went on a mission to make prescription drug prices more transparent and affordable for ordinary Americans. Revenue in the second quarter of 2021 amounted to $177 million with over 7.5 million app customers using the GoodRx app. While the company was the first to provide a comprehensive list of pharmacy drug prices, new players have entered the market. The rest of this article will be devoted to looking at the main GoodRx competitors.
DoorDash is an online food ordering and delivery platform founded by Tony Xu, Stanley Tang, Andy Fang, and Evan Moore in 2013. Together with its subsidiaries, DoorDash has a 56% market share in food delivery and a further 60% in the convenience delivery sector.
In 1965, PepsiCo acquired Frito-Lay in what the chairmen of both companies called a “marriage made in heaven”. The resultant company transformed PepsiCo from a soft drink organization and set it on a path to becoming one of the world’s leading food and beverage companies. Today, PepsiCo claims to operate in more than 200 countries and territories around the world with seven distinct divisions and many successful brands.
The Coca-Cola Company has 21 different billion-dollar brands or brands that generate more than $1 billion or more in revenue each year. The company also sells its products in nearly every country in the world, with Cuba and North Korea the only two countries where it is not sold officially. What’s more, the Coca-Cola brand is worth $87.6 billion, making it one of the most valuable among all companies. Though these figures allow Coca-Cola to enjoy market dominance in many countries, the company is nevertheless subject to intense competition.
Headquartered in Burbank, California, Disney has global reach and influence with its universally popular resorts, movies, streaming services, video games, and merchandise. But as one of the largest media conglomerates in the world with a diverse range of products in multiple marketplaces, Disney is no stranger to competition.
International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) is an American multinational technology company. It was founded in New York as the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company in 1911 by Charles Ranlett Flint. IBM is a diverse company with a similarly diverse portfolio of products and services. It produces and sells hardware, middleware, and software. It also offers hosting and consultancy services in nanotechnology and mainframe computers. What’s more, IBM has a strong culture in research and development, filing the most U.S. patents of any business for the past 28 years.
Starbucks is a multinational coffee chain headquartered in Seattle, Washington. It was founded by Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gordon Bowker in 1971. From a single and very humble bean roasting store in Pike Place Market, the company is now a global giant operating almost 33,000 stores around the world. This large global footprint obviously increases the competition for Starbucks in many different markets. The coffee industry itself is also highly competitive, with established players including McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts.
Boeing is best known for designing and manufacturing commercial aircraft, but the company also produces helicopters, rockets, satellites, spacecraft, missiles, and telecommunications infrastructure. Founded in 1916 by William Boeing in Seattle, Washington, the company is one of the largest aerospace manufacturers and defense contractors in the world.
While Google (now Alphabet) has been born as a search engine, it is now a diversified company, even though its core business remains search, as most of its revenues still come from Google, the search engine, and YouTube, the “video engine.” However, as a tech giant, which business is primarily based on advertising, the company does compete with Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft (with Bing), and Amazon (with e-commerce search and its advertising machine).
Peloton is a media and exercise equipment company primarily making money making money via its fitness products. The idea for the company came from John Foley, who argued that technology could help time-poor individuals get a full workout at home. The company competes with other players like Bowflex, NordicTrack, Life Fitness, MYX Fitness.
IKEA was founded in 1943 by Swedish businessman Ingvar Kamprad as a mail-order catalog business. The company is best known for selling affordable flat-pack furniture, but it also sells home accessories and kitchen appliances. Today, IKEA offers approximately 9,500 products across 445 stores in 52 countries. With such broad reach, IKEA is not immune to competition.
The Airbnb story began in 2008 when two friends shared their accommodation with three travelers looking for a place to stay. Just over a decade later, it is estimated that the company now accounts for over 20% of the vacation rental industry. As a travel platform, Airbnb competes with other brands like Booking.com, VRBO, FlipKey, and given its massive amount of traffic from Google. Also, platforms like Google Travel can be considered potential competitors able to cannibalize part of Airbnb’s market.
Salesforce is a cloud-based customer relationship management (CRM) provider, allowing businesses to build meaningful and sustained relationships with their customers. With robust, customizable software that integrates with social media, Gmail, and Microsoft Outlook, the Salesforce CRM platform is rated highly among businesses of all shapes and sizes. Recent data has shown that the company has captured 19.5% of the global CRM market.
In just fifteen short years, Shopify has grown from humble beginnings to become one of the fastest-growing eCommerce platforms online. The Shopify eCommerce solution is perhaps best suited to users who desire an easy, flexible and affordable starter solution for their online store. The provider now has upwards of 820,000 stores accounting for 20% of the total market share. However, the continued success of any company in the dynamic digital market is never guaranteed.
Netflix is the largest streaming video subscription service in the world. Created by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in 1997, the company has revolutionized the video content subscriptionmodel with over 139 million subscribers in 190 countries. The success of Netflix is due to two factors. The first is a recommendation system that gives suggestions on what customers should watch based on their viewing history. The second is the vast catalog of content on offer – produced by third parties and by Netflix itself. These factors have resulted in Netflix competing against influential TV networks and film producers for viewership.
YouTube is the most popular online video platform, a hybrid between a video search engine and a social media platform with a continuous feed prompted by social interactions and engagement. In fact, the platform is so popular that YouTube.com is the second most visited website on the internet. After being acquired by Google in 2006 for $1.65 billion, the platform now boasts over 2 billion registered users. Collectively, these users upload 500 hours of video every minute. The platform competes with other video engines like Vimeo, Dailymotion, and social platforms like IGTV, TikTok, and Twitch.
Zoom is a video platform, which enabled remote working. As such it competes with other large tech players like Google and Microsoft for the productivity space, and other startups like Slack and Go-To-Meetings.
As an electric automaker and builder of sports cars and now trucks, Tesla’s competitors comprise companies like Ford, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, Lamborghini, Audi, Rivian Lucid Motors, Toyota, and more. At the same time, Tesla is an electric energy production and storage company (SolarCity); it competes with Sunrun, SunPower, and Vivint Solar. And as an autonomous driving company, it competes with companies like Zoox, Waymo, and Baidu with the self-driving software.
Amazon is a consumer e-commerce platform with a diversified business model spanning across e-commerce, cloud, advertising, streaming, and more. Over the years, Amazon acquired several companies. As it operates across several industries, Amazon has a wide range of competitors across each of those industries. For instance, Amazon E-commerce competes with Shopify, Wix, Google, Etsy, eBay, BigCommerce.
Gennaro is the creator of FourWeekMBA, which reached about four million business people, comprising C-level executives, investors, analysts, product managers, and aspiring digital entrepreneurs in 2022 alone | He is also Director of Sales for a high-tech scaleup in the AI Industry | In 2012, Gennaro earned an International MBA with emphasis on Corporate Finance and Business Strategy.
