Brian Niccol wants your Starbucks order to be taken within four minutes of order

This is precisely the situation that the CEO of Starbucks, Brian Niccol, is determined to eliminate.

Niccol joined the Seattle -based coffee chain in September from last year, promising to bring the American coffee giant back to its roots. Investors have not yet approved the turnaround: the chain’s share price is down by almost 2% in the past year.

Without being discouraged, Niccol announced a new wave of investment last month focused on operational standards and customer service.

This includes the reshaping of staff hours to respond to advanced demand times, the deployment of technology to help organize drinking consumption more efficiently and create more space in the process so that the staff interact with customers.

Addressing Fox Business in an interview published yesterday, Niccol said that he had a time between a customer who was ordering and when he should have it in hand: precisely four minutes.

“I told our team, part of our recovery again becomes the largest customer service service company,” said Niccol in the interview. “It is focused on setting up enough partners on the list in stores, then deployed correctly so that they can provide this customer connection, this experience, on which Starbucks was really founded.”

This renewed concentration on speed is part of the “Green Tabl Service” initiative which has deployed in all stores this week, that Starbucks writes “on the fact that each visit feels personal”. It could be a “friendly smile, remember your name or make your day a little better”.

Part of the Starbucks headache is how to balance mobile sales, which represent around 30% of orders – with sales of drive and counter. Under the previous CEO of Starbucks, Laxman Narasimhan, the coffee giant reported that some of its disappointing sales were due to the fact that the brand was too popular with the morning shuttles who commanded via the application.

Narasimhan declared in May of last year that, at Peak Times Mobile and Pay, orders (MOP) saw incompletion rates in the middle of adolescence, adding: “In other words, customers using MOPs have put items in their basket and have sometimes chosen not to complete their order, citing long waiting and availability waiting times.”

Although Narasimhan identified the problem of off -putting waiting times, it is on Niccol’s watch that Starbucks puts the balance. This includes part of the introduction of a new algorithm that will guide orders that will be placed in which order, so that customers do not have to wait and monitor while mobile orders are priority.

“Many of us have had the experience where you go to a busy starbucks and there are a lot of mobile order stacked on the counter, and you just want a cup of coffee and sit in your third space,” said the new operational chief recently committed from Starbucks, Mike Grams.

The “third space” is the attempt at Starbucks to recover its importance in the life of customers, pushes the idea that their sites – neither at home nor at work – are where people can feel connected with their local community.

The turnaround so far

The recovery of a coffee giant with more than 32,000 stores around the world was never going to be fast.

But some green shoots in the fundamental principles of the company can be seen. In the third quarter of 2025, for example, global sales of stores decreased by 2%, driven by a drop of 2% in comparable transactions, but were partially offset from a 1% increase in the average ticket. A year earlier, sales of comparable global stores had decreased by 3%, driven by a 5% drop in comparable transactions, which was partially compensated for a 2% increase in the average ticket.

Similarly, in the third quarter of 2025, the consolidated net revenues increased by $ 4% to $ 9.5 billion, while at 3,2024, these net revenues decreased by $ 9.1 billion.

Niccol’s policies have received a mixed reaction from customers and staff.

For example, the company decided in January to reverse its policy with an open door, which means that only paid customers have been authorized to use its toilets.

Niccol obtained a retreat from the staff when he asked them to wear a solid black top under their aprons, and black or khaki blue jeans. According to Starbucks Workers United, plus

Other policies have proven to be more popular. For example, Niccol said shortly after joining the company that he should buy some 200,000 Sharpie pens to bring the coffee tradition to scraps customers’ names or smiling faces on their take -out cups.