Starbucks to cut 61 technology jobs in Seattle

Starbucks will lay off 61 corporate workers in its technology division at its Seattle headquarters, the company disclosed in a WARN filing on Monday.

The coffee giant, under CEO Brian Niccol, has been executing a ‌turnaround ⁠strategy, focused ⁠on improving metrics like wait times and reported customer ​satisfaction, helping sales, while profit margin recovery remains in ​question.

The cuts were not included in Starbucks' announcement last month that some technology jobs ​would move from Seattle to ⁠an upcoming office ‌in Nashville, Tennessee, focused on ​the company's ​supply chain.


The Worker Adjustment ⁠and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) filing, dated May ​7, said the layoffs are not ​the result of a relocation.

The layoffs, scheduled to begin in June, were previously reported by the Seattle Times based on an internal memo.

Starbucks' Chief Technology Officer ‌Anand Varadarajan was hired from Amazon in December, after the previous CTO, Deb ​Hall Lefevre, ​left the company ⁠in September.

As part of its turnaround, Starbucks has closed hundreds of stores it said were underperforming and last year laid off around 1,100 corporate workers.

Starbucks had raised its annual forecasts after a quarterly results beat in late April.