Starbucks Builds New Office Near CEO’s California Home: RTO

Starbucks has constructed a 4,624-square-foot office in Newport Beach, California, which is a five-minute drive from CEO Brian Niccol’s Orange County home.

According to documents and photos reviewed by Business Insider, the 13th-floor office was completed on July 2 and designed by Gensler, a leading architectural company that also designed the Chase Center in San Francisco and Shanghai Tower, China’s tallest building.

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A floor plan for the office, seen by BI, instructs Gensler and the contracting team, Pacific Tusk Builders, to build a space with “luxury” accents, including “white oak” floors and custom countertops. It also asks for “elegant lighting.”

Plans for the office were first disclosed in an August 2024 U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing outlining Niccol’s compensation package. The filing stated that Starbucks would begin planning to establish a “small remote office” in Newport Beach and “employ an assistant” for Niccol of his choosing.

“This office location will be maintained at the expense of the company,” the filing reads.

Starbucks told BI that other employees can use the new office, though it’s unclear how many other employees will be working from the office, how long the space took to construct, and how much it cost Starbucks to build.

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Starbucks also awarded Niccol a $1.6 million base salary, a $10 million signing bonus, and a $75 million equity grant over the next three years in his compensation package.

Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol. Photo by Robin Marchant/Getty Images

Niccol had previously been commuting at the company’s expense, flying 995 miles on the company’s private jet from his home in California to company headquarters in Seattle, Washington, to work from the office at least three times a week as part of the company’s return-to-office mandate.

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Earlier this month, Niccol sent a letter to employees stating that corporate staff will be required to return to the office four days a week starting in October, an increase from the three-day schedule set in 2023. He wrote that employees do their “best work” when they are together.

Employees can choose to receive a cash buyout of an undisclosed amount if they prefer to leave the company instead of working in the office.

“The default for support partners should be working in person, in a Starbucks office,” Niccol wrote in the letter. “We understand not everyone will agree with this approach.”

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Niccol became Starbucks CEO in September after leading Chipotle for six years as CEO. Under his leadership, Starbucks has tried to turn around slumping sales with a “Back to Starbucks” turnaround plan that has resulted in cuts to its menu, less wait time for coffee, and customers’ names written on cups in Sharpie.

On Tuesday, Starbucks also reported financial results for its 13-week fiscal quarter ending June 29. Global store sales dropped 2%, with North American store sales also falling by 2%, marking the sixth consecutive quarter of declining sales. Net revenue, however, increased 4% to $9.5 billion when compared to the same time last year.

The earnings report also mentioned that Starbucks opened 308 net stores in the quarter, for a total of 41,097 global stores.

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