Starbucks to shut down 200 Canadian locations in wake of pandemic

If the company does go ahead with the closures, that would mean losing 17 percent of their locations in Canada over the next year and a half. The franchise currently has 1,175 locations across the country.

“We will restructure our company-operated business in Canada over the next two years, with the potential of up to 200 additional stores being closed, with some of those stores being repositioned,” wrote Starbucks in a US regulatory filing, meaning they are either likely to move their locations or perhaps change the format of the ones they have, such as pick-up only.

Several Toronto Starbucks locations have been testing out the idea of pick-up only locations, first beginning back in January of this year.

Starbucks plans to close almost 400 locations across North America in response to plummeting sales tied to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The company is predicting an income drop of as much as $2.2 billion for its current-quarter of operations. Sales in the U.S. are expecting to be down for the duration of the year, from anywhere between 10 to 20 percent, however Starbucks is hoping to expand operations on their drive-thru locations.