Starbucks Business Model: How Does Starbucks Make Money?

Ever wondered if you should hop on the bandwagon and build an app like Starbucks?

Well, picture this – In 2025, the coffee industry is all set to generate a mind-boggling $102.98 billion, and with mobile devices glued to our hands, it’s quite an easy “yes”!

After all, Starbucks is a name that has become synonymous with coffee for many people. It is a leader in the premier rostering, marketing, and retailing of specialty coffee in the world. As of February 2023, the coffeehouse giant provides services across 83 countries and over 36,000 locations.

So, let’s see what’s their secret sauce, and how can you replicate their success? Let’s decode the math behind the curtain…

Simply put, Starbucks is a perfect example of a business taking notes from its experiences and then using that knowledge to continuously drive innovation in its offerings, business processes, and services.

Moreover, it has been able to early identify the vital role of technology in retail business and capitalised on it by launching and continuously innovating its immensely popular mobile app.

• Early identification of the smartphone revolution and capitalising on the same by adding relevant features.
• Providing in-app payments since 2011.
• Offering a pre-order option from the mobile app in 2014.
• Implementing AI and machine learning – Deep Brew – to deliver personalised user experiences since 2019.
• A close tie-up between Starbucks’ loyalty program and its mobile app.
• Digitally engaged customers purchase 2 to 3 times more products than traditionally engaged customers.

If you’re looking to start your own coffee business, then you can opt for custom mobile app development services to get a robust, high-load-tolerant, and highly scalable app that makes it easy for your customers to connect with your business.

In this blog post, we will look into the Starbucks mobile app, the features it provides to entice customers, and its role in making the brand even bigger, and commercially more successful.

We will also take a deep dive into the business model of Starbucks, and know how it makes money while delighting customers with its trademark coffee and ever-increasing roster of beverages, food, serveware, and other offerings. So, let’s start.

The History of Starbucks

Launched in – March 30, 1971

Founders – Gordon Bowker, Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl

Company evaluation – $112.61 billion (FY22)

Countries covered – 83 (FY22)

Locations available – 35,711 (FY22)

Employees – 402,000 (FY22)

Starbucks is the world’s largest coffeehouse chain. It was founded in 1971 by Jerry Baldwin, Gordon Bowker, and Zev Siegl. It opened as a coffee bean store in Seattle’s Pike Place Market.

The original founders sold it to Howard Schultz in 1982, who joined as the Director of Retail Operations and Marketing. After visiting Italy in 1983, Schultz decided to convert the store into a coffee shop serving espresso-based drinks. This was the birth of Starbucks as we know it today.

At present, the coffeehouse giant not only buys and roasts handcrafted and high-quality coffee drinks but also tea, other beverages, and an array of high-quality food items via its company-operated stores.

Other than its flagship brand of coffee, Starbucks sells goods and services under a slew of brands that include Ethos, Seattle’s Best Coffee, Starbucks Reserve, and Teavana.

The Impact of the Starbucks Mobile App on Its Commercial Success

Starbucks launched its mobile app back in 2009, which helped customers to make interactions with the business easier. It introduced in-app payments in 2011. Today, its mobile app plays a significant role in generating business opportunities and sales.

The Starbucks mobile app works in line with the coffeehouse company’s focus on increasing digital adoption in light of the increase in mobile orders and the demand for contactless order pick-ups.

The Starbucks mobile payment app was the most popular mobile payment app even before the advent of mobile payment apps like Apple Pay and Google Pay. Even today, the Starbucks Mobile App is the 6th most popular mobile payment app in the US with over 30 million users.

This is no simple feat considering the fact that while mobile payment apps can be used to pay at all types of retailers, the Starbucks mobile app allows making payments only at Starbucks stores. To make things even more creamier, a humongous more than 25% of Starbucks payments are processed via its app.

The Starbucks mobile app offers a convenient way for customers to do many things, ranging from ordering ahead for pickup and checking earned stars to claiming free drinks and food. Let’s take a brief look at the various features it offers to keep the customers coming back for more:

Features of Starbucks Mobile App

1. Earn and Redeem Rewards

The Starbucks mobile app makes it easy for customers to join the Starbucks Rewards program which offers them exclusive benefits by earning stars with purchases.

These stars can be easily redeemed via the mobile app for complimentary drinks, food, and more. The app also offers other ways to earn stars like earning double stars on certain days dubbed “Double Star Days” and completing “Bonus Star” challenges.

2. Gifting

Starbucks mobile app allows customers to purchase and gift their loved ones with digital Starbucks Cards, which can be redeemed via email or the mobile app itself.

3. Locate a Nearby Store

With this feature, the customer can find nearby Starbucks stores and get directions to reach them. The feature also enables customers to check store offerings prior to deciding to visit the same.

4. Order Placement and Payment

This feature allows customers to place their orders without actually visiting a Starbucks store. They can ensure that they get it right after they reach a nearby store. Therefore, no waiting time is involved. Moreover, it also benefits the coffeehouse company by reducing in-store congestion.

5. Pay in Store

The mobile app makes it easy to pay for various services. Support for multiple payment options ensures a smooth and delightful payment experience that ensures customer delight and increases brand loyalty.

6. Starbucks Card Management

This feature allows customers to manage their Starbucks Cards easily. This includes checking balance, adding money, viewing recent purchases, and transferring balances between cards.

7. Tip Your Barista

Starbucks customers can show their appreciation for exceptional service by tipping the barista directly from the app.

MVP Features of a Starbucks Like App You Must Consider

These handful of features are imperative from the early stage. Primarily, the features of an MVP (Minimum Viable Product), lay the foundation of your mobile application, curating it as self-sustaining and viable.

Let’s have a look!

Sign up

Regardless of the fast registration fad through social platform integration, users will leverage more benefits by creating profiles in your app. Profiles enable customers to get more customized advantages and better data security amalgamated with multi-factor authentication.

Simply put, hand-holding user data will let you easily track your target audience, eventually helping in making improved marketing decisions.

Menu

Often, the menu is designed to entice customers and stimulate their appetites. When you navigate through the Starbucks app or any other restaurant app, you see enticing images of delectable dishes and beverages, sparking instant cravings.

So, when it’s about your coffee delivery app development, ensure your menu exclusively portrays unique, appetizing photos of your offerings.

Here are the essential features for an app like Starbucks:

• Food catalog with organized subcategories
• Detailed item descriptions accompanied by alluring photos and titles
• Easy search functionality
• Customization options allowing users to select sizes and personalize their drinks.
• Clear call-to-action buttons facilitating purchases, adding items to orders, and saving favorites.

Order Pick-Up Convenience:

Considering the Starbucks app, streamlining experience with pre-order features eliminates the hassle of long lines during peak hours.

So, integrating order pick-up, ensures order is prepared in advance and ready for swift collection upon arrival. No queues, no payment challenges, just contended customers.

Though Starbucks prioritizes speedy pre-order fulfillment, Dunkin’ Donuts offers flexibility, allowing users to schedule coffee pick-ups up to 24 hours in advance. Make a decision that best aligns with your business needs.

Mobile Payment Integration

Mobile payment stands as a cornerstone in Starbucks – like payment features.

This is a standout innovation by Starbucks followed by e-wallet, simplifying payments further by allowing users to store electronic cards for easy transfers from credit and debit cards. This inclusion facilitates access to the loyalty program, allowing non-bank cardholders, like teenagers, to accrue points (stars) and enjoy bonuses and discounts.

Consider adopting a similar approach if your customer base includes teenagers. Yet, in catering to modern users’ penchant for choice and flexibility, diversify payment options to accommodate various preferences, including card payments and many other approaches.

Locate a Store

Location holds paramount importance for diners when selecting an eatery, so it’s crucial to integrate a map feature into your application. Especially if your business is operating in multiple locations, users should effortlessly locate the nearest one and get assistance for navigation if necessary.

Push Notifications

Nowadays, push notifications are much more than just a hook into your app. They’re a self-contained package of information that allows customers to complete a specific task. Not to sweep things under the carpet, but a delightful and useful notification proves to be a real opportunity to build a bond between customers and your app.

There are different types of push notifications that you can use in mobile ordering app development to retain customers, increase your conversion rate, improve customer targeting, track various metrics, and do much more.

But, what UX components are behind the app’s undefeatable success?

4 Key Takeaways from the Starbucks App

Starbucks underlined that app personalization is the secret sauce for increasing customer spending through the roof. Launched in 2009, it was a pioneer among the mobile payment apps on Apple App store.

1. Be the First Thing Your Customers Want

As Starbucks says, one of the crucial factors driving app sales is personalisation.

Repetitive users can favorite items, favorite outlets, and even set up a favorite drink customized exactly how they love it. Plus, new users can see how to do it (by selecting the green heart).

These  shortcuts allow savvy users of the app to skim through their orders. Besides, the efficiency, reliability and convenience all make it more likely to turn new users into repetitive ones.

In essence, the app means it’s faster to get a coffee at Starbucks, even if customers have to pass many coffee shops on their way there. It’s a powerful approach to build your brand, when you do it right!

 

2. Provide Seamless Integration

The first impression is the last impression, and coffee delivery app development is no exception. Starbucks app’s design clearly presents its brand ethics and feel.

Even better, the app makes the in-store experience much more convenient – no more hassle for users to count change – in fact, they can skip the queue altogether.

It makes everything so easy and intuitive and familiar for the customer.

3. Minimize Cognitive Load with Good Design

Choices make everyone feel good. But too many choices are daunting – it’s termed as cognitive load – and it often leads to customers leaving without making any choice at all. Here, Starbucks cleverly designed its app to minimize cognitive load, even though giving customers 160+ item choice on any given day.

A Quick Sneak Peek Into It’s Working:

When a user clicks to place an order, they see the “Featured” option before any other menu items. This subtle suggestion about the seasonal drinks makes it a lot easier for the customer to make a decision, subsequently making it easier for them to check out.

Once, users select the drink, they are navigated to the option of customizing their order. By drawing the line to customize from the main drinks page, the Starbucks app breaks down each decision into small steps, minimizing the cognitive load.

4. Level Up the Game of Rewards

There’s no doubt, the reward program is probably the best element of Starbucks app features.

The first thing you see on opening the app is the gold meter counting towards rewards, where you can redeem offers or free drinks. The closer a user gets to the rewards, the more likely they are to spend more to reach the reward. Also, Starbucks has established opportunities to gather bonus stars or holiday-related stars.

This gamification experience manifolded customer engagement with the app and drove sales. Trust me, the dopamine you get from watching that gold bar tick forward is intimidating.

Take Your Coffeehouse Business Online With Apptunix

Apptunix is an experienced software development company providing services across the globe. We have helped businesses across markets boost their sales and increase customer satisfaction by developing mobile apps that are scalable, robust, and resilient.

We have helped many businesses like Starbucks by delivering enterprise software development solutions and innovative online food delivery apps, that make it easy for their customers to place orders with just a few taps. Our mobile app developers are experienced in creating apps that have distinct, feature-loaded panels/modules for admins, partners, and customers.

Each of these panels comes replete with features that make the mobile app experience convenient and enjoyable, which, in turn makes users return over and over.

Connect with us today to share your project requirements so that our business experts can present you with the best options for taking your business to the next level.

Conclusion

Starbucks is a business that has carved its own market. With a strong presence in more than 80 countries, it is one of the few businesses that have achieved this remarkable feat.

Its unparalleled global success – contributed most notably by its ever-evolving mobile app in the early 2010s and later – is a great source of inspiration for many businesses across the globe. If you’re also looking forward to opening a coffeehouse business then you should definitely study the Starbucks mobile app and its business model to get cues on doing it right.

Your business should be easily available online with a fast and enticing website while a feature-loaded mobile app will make it easy for your customers to check your offerings and place orders directly from their mobile devices.

To help you realize a powerful website and mobile app, you can hire mobile app developers new york who will understand all your requirements and then present you with the best options as per your budget constraints and project development requirements. Godspeed!