Starbucks US Sales Jump 7.7%, but Revenue Misses as Shares Slip
Starbucks beat profit and sales forecasts on strong US demand, but revenue fell 4% to $9.14 billion and international traffic declined.
Starbucks said Thursday that sales at its established U.S. coffeehouses rose 7.7% in its fiscal fourth quarter, a sign that its turnaround effort at home is gaining speed. But total revenue fell short of Wall Street forecasts and international business barely grew, and the company’s shares fell almost 2% in after-hours trading, the Associated Press reported.
What happened
For the three months ended Sept. 27, global comparable store sales, which track sales at locations open at least a year, rose 7.2%, according to the company’s earnings release filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. That beat analyst expectations, although estimates differed slightly by source: the AP cited a 6% consensus from data firm FactSet, while Yahoo Finance put the Wall Street forecast at 6.2%. Yahoo Finance said it was the fifth quarter in a row that the figure came in above expectations.
The U.S. gain came from both higher prices per order and more visits. The average ticket rose 5.2% and the number of transactions rose 2.4%, the company said. The AP reported that growth was broad across age groups, income levels and times of day, helped by popular fall drinks and a matcha lineup that the company now describes as a $1 billion business, mostly sold in the afternoon.
Adjusted earnings, which exclude one-time items such as restructuring costs, came to 80 cents a share, up 54% from a year earlier and ahead of analyst forecasts of 71 to 72 cents. On a standard accounting basis, earnings were 59 cents a share.
Revenue, however, fell 4% to $9.14 billion, below the roughly $9.2 billion analysts expected. The drop mainly reflects China, where Starbucks moved its stores into a joint venture this spring. Boyu Capital, a Chinese investment firm, now operates the stores, and Starbucks keeps a 40% stake, according to the AP. The company recorded a pre-tax gain of $536.3 million on the deal.
Why it matters
The results suggest U.S. customers are still willing to pay for premium coffee even as many households say they feel stretched by high prices. A year ago, in the same quarter, U.S. comparable sales slipped 0.3%, according to the company’s release, so the latest figure marks a sharp reversal.
The weak spot is overseas. International comparable sales rose just 0.9%, far below the roughly 3% growth analysts had expected, according to Yahoo Finance, and international transactions fell 2.8%. That softness, combined with the revenue miss, appears to have weighed on the stock despite the earnings beat.
Brian Niccol, chairman and chief executive of Starbucks, who joined the company from Chipotle in 2024, struck a confident tone. “We have a clear plan. We’ve been working the plan. And the plan is working,” he said in prepared remarks cited by Yahoo Finance. In the earnings release, he said that what began as a turnaround plan, known internally as Back to Starbucks, is now the company’s growth plan.
Background
The turnaround has involved painful cuts. In late September, Starbucks said it was immediately closing 250 North American stores, its second large round of closures under Niccol, the AP reported. In September 2025, the company closed 627 stores in North America and Europe. Even so, it ended the quarter with 41,607 coffeehouses worldwide, including 16,781 in the U.S.
For the full fiscal year, revenue rose 2% to $37.9 billion, slightly under the $38 billion Wall Street expected, while adjusted earnings rose 28% to $2.72 a share, according to Yahoo Finance and the company. Cathy Smith, Starbucks’ chief financial officer, said in the release that the company had returned to comparable sales growth, expanded margins and delivered stronger earnings in fiscal 2026.
What comes next
Starbucks gave a cautious revenue outlook for fiscal 2027, a year that will have 53 weeks instead of the usual 52. Key points from its guidance include:
- Total revenue down about 1%, mostly because of China, compared with the 1% increase Wall Street had forecast, according to the AP.
- North American comparable sales growth of about 4%, slower than the 6.6% pace in fiscal 2026.
- Adjusted earnings of $3.15 to $3.25 a share.
- About 1,200 net new coffeehouses globally, led by international markets.
The company has also said that slight declines in coffee prices and fewer new cafe openings in North America would weigh on revenue next year. Whether U.S. momentum can offset a slower international business is likely to be the central question for the company in the year ahead.
