Sep 05 2007
Want Starbucks Made in China?
Starbucks doing China too? Most of their great looking products are imported from China already- but now their coffee? Will this be fair trade coffee? Hm, I doubt it. I have copied excerpts of this Reuters Article for commentary.
SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Starbucks Corp (SBUX.O: Quote, Profile, Research), the world’s biggest coffee-shop chain, said it planned to source coffee from China for the first time as it expands in a country with more than 5,000 years of tea-drinking culture.
Starbucks has been working with coffee farmers in China’s southwestern Yunnan province to help them meet sourcing standards and has sent coffee shipments to the United States for testing, Starbucks China President Wang Jinlong said at the Reuters China Century Summit on Tuesday.
“China does produce some quality coffee,” Wang said at the summit, held at the Reuters office in Shanghai.
He added that sourcing coffee from China would start “very soon, maybe in a couple of years”.
Some analysts say import tariffs as high as 20 to 60 percent are the reason why companies such as Starbucks are considering sourcing coffee from China.
However, Starbucks’ Shanghai-based spokeswoman, Caren Li, said the aim was to add new flavors, not to avoid tariffs.
Does anyone else find it interesting that tarrifs are so high to export our goods to China? Does that seem fair? Also, Starbucks admits the reason for producing in china is not to spare themselves tarrifs but rather to produce the flavors from China. Right now, if that includes lead, I don’t want it? Or what if they use pesticides that we would never consume here in the states (knowingly). China’s Produce and food industry has been under such great scrutiny lately that this move surprises me to some extent.
Starbucks also plans to build a roasting plant in China and accelerate its expansion in the world’s fourth biggest economy.
Wang reiterated that the Seattle-based company aimed to more than triple its global outlets to 40,000 and expected China to become its biggest overseas market.
Starbucks currently operates 540 outlets in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan, but the figure “should be in thousands in the near future”, Wang said.
In mainland China, where Starbucks has 246 outlets, the company is buying out its Chinese partners to gain more control of its brand.
From a business perspective there could be good reason to build your brand in China. After all, it is the most populated country on earth. However, importing coffee grown in China is something I want no part of. I don’t trust it, even with a Starbucks brand on it.
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