Starbucks leaves downtown storefront empty

There were few people Tuesday on the typically busy Main Street sidewalk outside the downtown Starbucks, a popular draw for foot traffic since opening in 1999, according to city staff.

The 425 W. Main St. location closed Saturday, according to neighboring business owners. The signs have been removed from the building and the windows have been obstructed from the inside by brown butcher paper.

A sign on the door invites coffee drinkers to visit the new Starbucks set to open Thursday just over a block away. The new 2,200-square-foot shop at 360 W. 16th St. will feature a drive-thru for coffee-loving motorists.

A few doors over from the shuttered store, owners of Little Oven Pizza prepared to open for the day to sell their gourmet pizzas by the slice. Owner Dan Verechia said he first noticed Starbucks closed on Saturday.

“It’s definitely going to have an effect on foot traffic,” he said on Tuesday. “I was hoping that they’d keep it open.”

It’s too early to know how much the move will hurt area shop owners, he said, but empty storefronts in downtown are not good for the remaining merchants.

A couple of Starbucks employees leaving the store on Tuesday spoke to surprised coffee fans, who wondered what happened to their go-to location.

Esai Covarrubias, 20, of Delhi said he stopped in at the Main Street Starbucks almost daily. Holding a laptop bag in his hand, he said it’s where he would go to study between his classes at Merced College.

“It’s kind of disappointing,” he said. “I’m just going to have to find a coffee shop downtown.”

He said he likes that downtown is friendly to walkers.

There are other places to grab a cup of joe downtown, such as the locally owned Coffee Bandits or Wired Cafe, the latter of which is staffed by Merced County Office of Education employees and adult students with special needs.

Rob Matsuo, the president of the Merced Main Street Association, said he’s optimistic Starbucks’ move will bode well for the local coffee sellers. Also co-owner of Five Ten Bistro, he agreed that Starbucks has been a draw for office workers and city employees who work within walking distance.

Rumors of the corporately owned Starbucks move have been thrown around for more than year. About a half-dozen inquiries by the Sun-Star since May 2015 have been returned by Starbucks’ media relations department, which has said repeatedly the corporation had no intention of closing the Main Street store.

The media relations department did not return a request for comment on Tuesday.

The Central San Joaquin Valley stores are more and more often built with a drive-thru, according to Frank Quintero, Merced’s director of economic development. In a July interview, Quintero said he was under the impression that the corporation intended to keep both stores open.

The Main Street location’s lease had a clause that allowed for the company to leave the building. “At the time, they didn’t think they were going to execute it, but, obviously, things have changed,” he said. “That’s pretty consistent with what Starbucks is doing, at least in our type of market. They’re going more to drive-thru than they are for the sit-down type of cafes.”

Quintero said UC Merced officials are assisting the city to try to fill the Main Street building as soon as possible. Several buildings along the street were built using redevelopment money, he said, and Starbucks has been the only tenant at that address.

“It’s set up for coffee or a cafe,” he said. “It would be easy to move into.”

This story was originally published August 30, 2016 at 5:44 PM with the headline "Starbucks leaves downtown storefront empty."