Starbucks has been in Romania for more than a decade and has been operating as a franchise from the beginning. The franchise holder in Romania is Polish-held Amrest, which operates in several countries. Amrest has other franchises as well, among which KFC, Pizza Hut and Burger King, but not in Romania, where it only operates the café chain it took over along with the network in Bulgaria in 2015.
“We are currently operating 38 cafés in Romania and seven in Bulgaria,” says Mateusz Sielecki, regional director of Starbucks for Romania and Bulgaria.
Amrest operates 300 Starbucks cafés on seven markets, he added.
One thing that stands out in Romania is that the brand is very popular and well-known after more than ten years of presence. Moreover, the coffee is part of the local culture and people like going out for a cup of coffee, Mateusz Sielecki says.
When Amrest took over, there were only 19 Starbucks cafés in Romania, and now there are 38. Romania is the second largest market in Central and Eastern Europe and is undeveloped and the café penetration is still low, the Amrest official said.
Sielecki sees potential for the network to double, by growing at a rate of ten cafés a year, as until now. Amrest will pursue balanced development between Bucharest and the major cities in the country, after having opened in three new cities last year, Sibiu, Oradea and Galati.
Starbucks is now operating in 11 cities of Romania other than Bucharest, twice more than at the arrival of Amrest.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)