The Starbucks in Highland Park Village is one of the first locations in Texas, but it is set to leave its spot after 30 years of service.
“Starbucks is moving in a different direction,” Dallas Observer’s food editor Lauren Drewes Daniels said. “The company as a whole is going towards more, like output and throughput, like they want to move more people through the doors faster to drive through.”
And that makes sense since 54% of U.S.-based coffee consumers prefer drive-thru coffee due to the ease and convenience. That’s the results of the research done in 2023 by Allegra World Coffee Portal.
“People's… time sensitivities have changed,” University of Texas marketing professor Raji Srinivasan said. “I think given the high price of the retail locations, high labor costs, and the related unionization challenges… I think it makes sense from a customer perspective, company perspective, to increase sales through to-go and mobile orders than seating customers.”
Society may be moving in a different direction, but this Starbucks location will always be considered among the first to help pioneer a new coffeehouse culture.
“I remember… the first time people really drank Starbucks,” Daniels said. “We’re like, ‘this tastes like burnt coffee.’ Now we're all acclimated to it, and it's the standard of what coffee should taste like.”
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