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Coffee giant’s planned expansion prompts concerns
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Megan McClenny talks with a customer as she works the espresso machine at Steaming Bean on Monday afternoon. The arrival of Starbucks on Main Avenue is generating concerns among downtown coffee shop owners who fear they won't be able to compete with the coffee giant./Photo by Todd Newcomer.
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by Will Sands
Corporate coffee is landing in downtown Durango. Starbucks, the coffee giant that now boasts more than 6,500 outlets worldwide, is adding downtown Durango to the list. The announcement has prompted some concern among local coffee shops, and there is discussion of forming a coalition to encourage consumption of local joe.
Starbucks is the Seattle-based coffee retailer that started with fewer than 100 stores in 1990. Now, there are more than 4,400 Starbucks outlets within the United States, thousands more internationally. The company has attained such success that its green mermaid motif is directly linked to the act of grabbing a cup of coffee in many an American mind.
Starbucks made its first entry into the Durango market nearly three years ago when a locally-owned Starbucks coffee cart went into business inside the local Albertson's grocery store. Independent of the coffee cart, Starbucks is now going forward with plans to open a large company-owned outlet in the 500 block of Main Avenue.
"We're looking into possibilities," said Phil Smith, marketing manager for Starbucks. "I can't go into details, but yes, we're looking at opening a store in downtown Durango."
Smith said that the Albertson's cart will most likely remain in business in spite of the new company store, which he said is opening because of local demand. Smith said that the corporation decides to open such a store in a community largely based on local feedback.
"For the most part, the decision is made based on feedback from the customer base," Smith said. "We've gotten a lot of feedback from your community and would like to deliver the 'Starbucks Experience' to a special place like Durango."
However, as word of Starbucks' impending arrival has spread, it has generated a different flavor of local feedback. The "Starbucks Experience" is beginning to generate strong concerns in an already competitive local java scene.
Steaming Bean owner, Julie Dunn, said that she was saddened to hear that the company is coming downtown. Dunn has operated her local coffee shop in the 900 block of Main Avenue for the last six years and always feared the arrival of the coffee giant.
"I've said from Day 1 that as soon as Starbucks comes downtown, I would close my doors," she said. "I don't feel that way any more, but I know if Starbucks moved in across the street, it would probably shut me down."
Tom Mulligan, owner of Magpies Newstand Café, is located considerably closer
to the proposed Starbucks outlet. He noted that Durango is already fairly saturated
with coffee shops, and adding a corporate store to the mix could make it hard
on everyone.
"We already have quite a few great coffee shops in town," Mulligan said. "It would be easy to say that the niche is covered. To throw another one into the mix is going to make it more difficult for everyone. That's especially true when you consider that the new shop will not be homegrown."
Tim Wheeler, owner of the Durango Coffee Co., agreed that competition for the Durango dollar is already stiff among local coffee shops. "There's already a lot of competition, and there's no complacency on our part. There are a lot of places you can go in Durango for a cup of coffee," he said.
Steaming Bean looks predominantly to locals to keep its doors open, according to Dunn, and tourism has always just been the icing. However, Mulligan said that Magpies counts on a bump in tourist business every summer, and now he fears it may go away.
"Through most of the year, we're lucky to maintain a loyal, local following," he said. "In the summer, we require tourist4 traffic to help our profit margin. Looking forward, I'm afraid a tourist will go in the direction of Starbucks instead of experience the unknown."
Dunn, Mulligan and Wheeler all acknowledged that Starbucks has been good for the coffee industry as a whole, and that a new local store will help spread the coffee and tea buzz.
"Anytime that people are introduced to the subtleties and wide-ranging pleasures of coffees and teas, it will probably encourage business," Wheeler said.
However, Durango can be hard on small business owners, even local institutions like Dunn's Steaming Bean, and she argued that Starbucks will bring uneven odds to the table.
"What Starbucks has that we don't have is familiarity," she said. "People can go all over the world and they know what they're going to get. That's what Starbucks has over us. They also don't have the same worries and concerns we do. They don't walk the same fine line I do. This is not their reality."
The continued franchising of downtown Durango is also a major concern for all three coffee shop owners.
"I'm a little chagrined every time there's a chain that shows up in town," Wheeler said. "It just makes us seem more and more like everywhere else."
Dunn added that the outskirts of Durango are already overrun with franchises, making the entrance into downtown especially distressing. "I'm sad that we allowed Starbucks to come into downtown," she said. "There are so many areas in Durango that already have chains. I really didn't think they would come into our historic downtown."
Already, the coffee shop owners are discussing how they will adjust to the eventual arrival of a Starbucks on Main. There's been talk of forming a local coffee coalition as well as creating a local punch card that would function at any locally owned coffee shop.
"Some kind of an advertising campaign to draw attention to ourselves would be a good move," Mulligan added. "Making the tourist aware that we are here is where we'll have to get creative."
However, all three local coffee shop owners agreed that they will also have to continue doing good local business to survive and offer customers something that is unique to Durango.
"We just have to do what we do really well," Wheeler said. "Our approach is one of being very personable, prompt and pleasant. I want our customers feeling better than when they came in."
Dunn concluded, "You give to the local community and it gives back threefold. I can go in my coffee house and know 75 percent of the people on any given day. This is the local flavor of Durango."
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