Starbucks Corporation (SBUX) CFO on the Company’s Huge International Opportunities

Alstead: Well, that’s an interesting big question. I believe because we are so predominantly ahead here in the U.S., that the U.S. likely leads in that, for as long forward as I can think about, because we aren’t stopped here. We have lots more to do here.  But it won’t take long before China is our second largest market in the world. We, within the next couple of years will get to that point, and it’s the No. 2 and will firmly be No. 2 in size and scale and profitability we believe for a lot of years to come.

Tom: What about India?

Alstead: India, we’ve just opened two months ago. What’s interesting about India is we had never had a store in India until just recently, and yet when we’ve opened up in that marketplace, we’re serving so many customers, the lines are around the block. We can barely process people quick enough through the store. It’s been quickly embraced in Mumbai and in Delhi overnight, and with the opening of the first stores. Not unlike what we’ve seen in China, not unlike what we saw in Vietnam that we just opened a month ago.

The awareness of the brand, the awareness of the concept, the appeal for what we do, the recognition of the quality of this experience predates us getting places these days, and that’s allowed us to open up in a place like India that we also believe has a huge opportunity over time and grow our business, again on the right pace, but to a very large business ultimately.

The article Starbucks CFO on the Company’s Huge International Opportunities originally appeared on Fool.com.

Tom Gardner owns shares of Starbucks. The Motley Fool recommends Starbucks. The Motley Fool owns shares of Starbucks.

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