Starbucks to relocate supply chain workers from HQ to new Nashville office

Starbucks is relocating the team responsible for sourcing products from its corporate headquarters in Seattle to a new office in Nashville.

Dozens of Seattle-area employees on Starbucks’ supply chain team will be asked to relocate. The company would not provide an exact number, but there are more than 100 Starbucks employees in the region who say they work in sourcing on their LinkedIn profiles.

The goal of the new office, opening later this year, is to establish a presence in the southeast, where the company sees some of the most potential for growth. The new office will also bring the sourcing team closer to Starbucks’ suppliers.

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In an internal email shared with KUOW, Sanjay Shah, Starbucks’ chief supply chain officer, said: “We have both opportunity and ambition to grow in North America, particularly in the central U.S., in the south and in parts of the northeast ... to support these ambitions, we have made the decision to establish a strategic presence in the Southeast region of the U.S.”

That growth is part of the “Back to Starbucks” initiative in which the company is redesigning and opening new stores in an attempt to return to its cozy coffeehouse roots.

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