By DEE-ANN DURBIN
AP Business Writer
Starbucks posted stronger-than-expected sales in its fiscal second quarter as demand in China began to recover and it opened nearly 500 new stores around the world.
The Seattle coffee giant said Tuesday that its net revenue jumped 14% in the January-March period to $8.72 billion. That was better than the $8.41 billion Wall Street had forecast, according to analysts polled by FactSet.
Same-store sales — or sales at stores open at least a year — rose 11% as traffic picked up in stores. That also beat analysts’ forecast of a 7.3% increase.
Same-store sales in China were up 3%, reversing a 29% decline the company saw in its October-December period due to a spike in COVID infections. In North America, same-store sales climbed 12%, and the company reported more store visits as well as higher spending per visit.
Starbucks said it opened 464 net new stores during the quarter, including 100 in North America. As part of a larger plan to reinvigorate sales, Starbucks has been closing underperforming locations and replacing them with stores in higher-traffic areas or smaller stores that are focused on pickup or drive-thru business.
Starbucks’ earnings rose 35% to $908 million. Adjusted for one-time items, the company earned 74 cents per share. That also beat analysts’ forecast of 65 cents.
Shares in Starbucks fell 2% in after-market trading.
Tuesday’s earnings report was the first presided over by Laxman Narasimhan, who took over as Starbucks’ CEO at the end of March.
Narasimhan is a former PepsiCo executive who most recently served as CEO of the U.K.-based health and nutrition company Reckitt. At Starbucks, he succeeded longtime leader Howard Schultz, who came out of retirement last spring to serve as interim CEO while the company searched for a new chief executive.
