More Stories

Informist, Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025

 

--Tata Consumer MD: To open 40-50 Starbucks stores in FY26

--Tata Consumer MD: To end FY26 with 515-520 Starbucks stores

--Tata Consumer MD: Bullish on Starbucks future potential in India

--Tata Consumer MD: Starbucks growth plans to be in tune with demand

By Avishek Rakshit

 

KOLKATA - Tata Consumer Products Ltd. is slowing down the expansion of Starbucks branded cafe, which it set up as a joint venture with the US-based Starbucks Corp., in the current financial year as the company wants to have a realistic store opening target and strives to improve store performance.

 

At best, Tata Consumer aims to exit the current financial year with a total store count of 515-520 with a net new store addition of 40-50 stores. This will imply Tata Starbucks Pvt. Ltd.--the joint venture which owns and operates the Starbucks stores in India--registering its lowest total store growth at least in the past five years. The current total store growth rate is set to halve compared with 13.8% growth rate in the last financial year.

 

"This year you would broadly see a net of 40 to 50 stores opened for this financial year. We are almost at a 500," Sunil D'Souza, the managing director and chief executive officer at Tata Consumer Products, told Informist. "I would say it (total store count) will probably be in the range of 515 to 520 stores by the end of this year."

 

In the last financial year, Tata Starbucks net added 58 stores, taking the total store count to 479, a 13.8% growth. The revenue growth in 2024-25 (Apr-Mar), however, fell short of the total store growth and only grew by around 5% on year to INR 12.8 billion. As of Sept. 30, the company had a total of 492 stores and had opened 11 new stores in the current financial year.

 

"We opened seven outlets last quarter so you can see roughly the same number of outlets being opened at least for the next one-two quarter(s)," D'Souza said.

 

D'Souza had earlier told Informist that reaching its target of 1,000 cafe counts by FY28 was unlikely as Tata Consumer is slowing down its store expansion plans in line with consumer demand and macroeconomic conditions.

 

D'Souza said that the company is targeting an aggressive same-store growth to drive revenue and profits. "The (same store growth) target is high. Right now, I'm happy to get back into positive territory. October was a bit soft, but I think that was because there were more rainy days in October compared to last year but November has been on a strong footing," he said.

 

A report from market intelligence firm Mordor Intelligence pegs the cafe and bar market size in India at $18.83 billion in 2025 which is forecast to reach $30.11 billion by 2030, reflecting a 9.8% compounded annual growth rate. Rapid urbanisation, rising disposable incomes, and the fusion of traditional tea culture with the global trend of rising coffee consumption are expanding the addressable customer base, the research firm said.

 

Although Tata Consumer is slowing down its expansion of Starbucks, which is the largest cafe chain in the country by store count, the company is bullish on the growth prospects in India.

 

"There are three-four big trends working for it (coffee consumption in India). Number one is coffee consumption in India is on the rise, both in home and out of home. Number two is, the number of stores are under-indexed for the population. Number three is, as GDP per capita continues to rise, people will start spending more on discretionary (items)," D'Souza said.

 

D'Souza said that availability of good retail space in malls is a limiting factor to rapid expansion. At 1302 IST, shares of Tata Consumer traded 0.57% down at INR 1,157.20 on the National Stock Exchange.

 

Starbucks Journey in India for last five years:

 

	Store Count	Additions	Total Store Growth (in %)	Cities	Revenue (in INR billion)
FY26	515-520 (estimated)	40-50 (estimated)	7.5-8.6% (estimated)	80 (estimated)
FY25	479	58	13.8%	80	12.8
FY24	421	95	26.4%	61	12.2
FY23	333	71	24.3%	41	10.9
FY22	268	50	21.3%	26	6.4

 

Source - Annual Reports and company's interaction with Informist.

End

 

US$1 = INR 89.87

IST, or Indian Standard Time, is five-and-a-half hours ahead of GMT

 

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

 

For users of real-time market data terminals, Informist news is available exclusively on the NSE Cogencis WorkStation.

 

Cogencis news is now Informist news. This follows the acquisition of Cogencis Information Services Ltd. by NSE Data & Analytics Ltd., a 100% subsidiary of the National Stock Exchange of India Ltd. As a part of the transaction, the news department of Cogencis has been sold to Informist Media Pvt. Ltd.

 

Informist Media Tel +91 (22) 6985-4000

Send comments to feedback@informistmedia.com

 

© Informist Media Pvt. Ltd. 2025. All rights reserved.