Starbucks is testing an entirely new way to bring you your iced latte
The company is testing curbside pickup at a store in Snoqualmie, Washington, meaning baristas will bring coffee and food orders right to customers' cars, according to Nomura analyst Mark Kalinwoski.
"Customers using the Starbucks mobile app to order and pay (apparently for this store only) can choose to have their order delivered to them curbside by a barista, so that they don't even have to get out of their car to get their order," Kalinowski wrote in a recent research note.
The store doesn't have a drive-thru lane, so prior to the test, customers had to park and get out of their cars to pick up an order.
Kalinowski says the test takes mobile order-and-pay "to the next level."
"We'll be curious to see how this one-store test fares and if other non-drive-thru Starbucks stores test out curbside pickup," he wrote.
We asked Starbucks if the test is just limited to that one store. The company hasn't yet responded.
Curbside pickup is growing in popularity across the retail industry.
Walmart, Kroger, and Harris Teeter all offer the service, meaning customers can order groceries and other items online and have them loaded directly into their cars by an employee.
CVS also offers the service, and recently expanded it from 361 locations to more than 4,100 stores across the US.
Curbside requires a lot of extra labor to pick and pack items and attend to a curbside lane outside stores.
It hasn't been a success for some retailers, like Target, which in June ended its partnership with the Curbside app - a service that helps retailers offer curbside pickup.
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