Starbucks in the Green Market
Starbucks–the largest coffee chain in the world–has very quickly phased itself into the green marketplace in recent years. In just 2020, the company announced several new environmental goals in an overall effort to reduce their footprint by reducing emissions and conserving resources. Traditionally–like any global franchise–their large-scale production creates many externalities in terms of polluting the environment, which indirectly degrades natural lands and resources which are public goods. Their new set of green goals commits to carbon neutrality (specifically for their coffee) by 2030 as well as cutting water usage in half. In the past, Starbucks as a whole hasn’t necessarily been devoted to sustainability in general or even the green market (and naturally so, being an international cafe business)–but their newfound focus on coffee-specific sustainability is not only intriguing but critical considering the rise in demand for fair trade products in recent years, especially considering the unsavory reputation of coffee plantations. Starbucks has a very large social responsibility to maintain in terms of looking sustainable for the sake of their competitors (other coffee chains) and their main consumer audience (millennials and generally younger, more liberal coffee drinkers).
Starbucks’ coffee does indeed reflect their greater drive for general sustainable efforts on a company-wide basis. Starbucks is making the daring step towards becoming a “resource positive company, to take less and give more to the planet in every aspect of its business–including coffee. Starbucks is…committed to a sustainable future for coffee,” (Starbucks Stories). By setting specific goals for their coffee production and supply chain such as reaching “carbon neutral green coffee” and conserving half of all water use in coffee processing plants by the year 2030, Starbucks is displaying a devotion to sustainable practices for their specific green good: coffee. By the same token, the company is pledging to cut its entire footprint–from waste to water to carbon–in half for all departments of production, not just coffee. Though their commitment to sustainability may have been initiated and inspired by their coffee product specifically, they have very rapidly applied this enthusiastic effort to all products that fall under the Starbucks brand. Starbucks has always placed greater emphasis on the sourcing of their coffee in particular. As a company, they purchase coffee internationally from 30 different countries and over 400,000 coffee farmers–hence, responsible purchasing is especially important on their scale of business. This is no new ordeal for Starbucks–for quite some time, they have worked directly with Coffee and Farmer Equity (C.A.F.E.) Practices for the sake of longevity and productivity of their relationship with their farmers. Since the farming process of growing and harvesting coffee itself is a highly energy and emission intensive activity, Starbucks has focused on farm to port (“the first ten feet”) processes before other steps in the supply chain such as roasting, transporting, or packing the coffee. Starbucks CEO Dr. M. Sanjayan explains that their business model highlights the “‘immediate actions to reduce their footprint and invest in nature…it’s good for business, good for people, and essential for our climate.” With Starbucks leaders and management openly advertising their allegiance with sustainability, it is made clear that the firm’s overall, long-term goal reflects their resolution to be green. Market leaders such as Starbucks and other large, multinational franchises are known for their history of environmental degradation, especially purely from the standpoint of the sheer volume of input required to meet the demands of their customers for output. Thus, making such drastic green goals showcases Starbucks’ intention in creating a new vision for themselves and not just their coffee. For example, under the establishment of their carbon neutrality goal, they are taking specific measures such as providing their farmers with advanced equipment that allow them to decrease fertilizers as well as emissions. In addition, Starbucks has donated over 60 million coffee trees of a species that can withstand variable climate conditions. Not only are they taking preventative measures, but they are actively working in environmental restoration efforts in partnership with Conservation International to protect forests and remove carbon for the sake of the local ecosystems in Columbia and Peru (Starbucks Stories). In terms of their water conservation efforts, the company has invested in at least 1200 ecological wet mills as well as other coffee processing technologies that increase efficiency to save water use. Starbucks’ sustainability enterprise doesn’t stop at just green coffee–it is apparent that their entire value chain has been planned with climate change and environmental factors in mind to reduce externalities (unwanted byproducts of their green goods) for their entire product line.
While Starbucks has claimed that their coffee is a green good, there lies the question of whether or not it truly helps the environment. The obvious caveat with any green product produced by any major franchise or large corporation is that their goods are rarely the most sustainable option on the market, even if they are sustainable to some degree. The extent to which these corporations are actually making an impact on the environment is also a concedingly difficult value to measure simply due to the skew of transparency–or lack thereof–of data. Coffee is particularly difficult to source and trace to determine its exact ecosystem impact based on the disconnect between consumers and the overseas coffee farms themselves. On a more accessible and easy to analyze scale, Starbucks has additionally announced changes to 28,000 of its stores across the globe including an expansion of their plant-based menu (milks and meats), reusable packaging instead of single-use plastics, and pickup-only stores via mobile ordering similar to the Panera interface (Maynard). Some environmental advocates and activists show criticism for Starbucks’ newly released set of green goals: Greenpeace campaigner Kate Melges expresses her concern explaining “Without more detailed plans on how Starbucks will make this happen, it’s difficult to say the solutions Starbucks pursues will be taking us in the right direction.” Similarly, renowned climate activist Greta Thunberg has criticized large corporations such as Starbucks for making bold yet vague claims to meet certain environmental goals in a certain amount of years with set projected outcomes by goal years such as 2030 or 2050, while activists are fighting to see change now instead of some future time when everyone will forget. It is unlikely that a company as large and as prosperous as Starbucks is willing to exacerbate costs on the absolute most ethical practices or the highest quality ingredients or anything that would put their extreme wealth and high profits at jeopardy. There is also difficulty in measuring the exact level of fairness in their trade–though they claim to help their farmers and source from more sustainable coffee tree species, the fact that the growing and processing of their coffee happens so far away from the consumer makes it easy to ignore when we can’t see any malpractice happening before the consumers’ eyes. Environmental impact of their coffee manufacturing is also something that is difficult to trace back to the Starbucks company specifically, not to mention that it is difficult to discern the trajectory of new coffee farms when there is no historical or empirical calculation for the basis of their carbon footprint. Hence, it is impossible to say for certain whether the life cycle of Starbucks’ new coffee trees and farms are truly sustainable in the long run. The key may lie in the fact that on a circular analysis of Starbucks’ new coffee, the environmental detriments are less harmful than the old coffee they produced (in Kenya, Guatemala, Mexico, etc.). Thus, the only judgment that may be accurately made is that Starbucks coffee is better than what it used to be in terms of externalities and environmental degradation, not necessarily greener than the competing coffee companies. At the end of the day, any big corporate market leader will always choose profit over being perfect in the green sense or truly achieving their goals or establishing a circular economy of their good. On a similar note, Starbucks is certainly not the first company to have added options such as oat milk to their menus for environmental reasons. On average, oat milk tends to be more costly than its alternatives–Starbucks wasn’t willing to give into the social pressures of adding such an item to their menu for the sake of profit until it would otherwise hurt their reputation not to do so. Generally, local or artisan coffee shops (not franchises like Starbucks) are known for leading the shift in green menu items, since their supply chain is not nearly as vast and intricate as Starbucks.
Photo by Olivia Lim on Unsplash
Written by Carole Wilay (’25)