Local Blogs
By Elena Kadvany
E-mail Elena Kadvany
About this blog:
Get the latest food news with the biweekly Peninsula Foodist newsletter.
I am a perpetually hungry twenty-something journalist, born and raised in Menlo Park and currently working at the Palo Alto Weekly as education and youth staff writer. I graduated from USC with a major in Spanish and a minor in journalism. Though my first love is journalism, food is a close second. I am constantly on the lookout for new restaurants to try, building an ever-expanding "to eat" list. As a journalist, I'm always trolling news sources and social media websites with an eye for local food news, from restaurant openings and closings to emerging food trends. When I was a teenager growing up in Menlo Park, I always drove up to the city on weekends with the singular purpose of finding a better meal than I could at home. But in the past year or so, the Peninsula's food culture has been totally transformed, with many new restaurants opening and a continuous stream of San Francisco restaurants coming south to open Peninsula outposts. Don't navigate this food boom hungry and alone! Feed me your tips on new chefs and eats and together we'll share them with the broader community.
(Hide)
View all posts from Elena Kadvany
La Boulange Palo Alto to close
Uploaded: Jun 17, 2015
Starbucks announced Tuesday that it will be closing all of its 23 La Boulange locations, including one in downtown Palo Alto, describing the cafes as "not sustainable for the company's long-term growth."
Starbucks acquired La Boulange, then a San Francisco-based patisserie and café chain, in 2012 for $100 million. The
Palo Alto location opened the same year at 151 University Ave., a prime downtown corner with a large outdoor patio.
La Boulange opened in downtown Palo Alto in 2012, the same year the company was acquired by Starbucks. Palo Alto Weekly file photo.
The closest Peninsula location is in Burlingame; most locations are concentrated in San Francisco, with a few in the East Bay and Marin as well.
Since "food is a key element of Starbucks growth strategy," the company will continue to sell La Boulange items in its stores, but the stand-alone cafes and the two manufacturing facilities that serve those locations will be shuttered by the end of September, Starbucks said in a
statement. The manager of the Palo Alto cafe said the location will be closed Sept. 25 and declined to comment further.
Starbucks said that La Boulange employees "are being treated with the utmost care" and when possible, will be placed at a Starbucks in the area.
"Starbucks goals to grow its food business and deliver an incremental $2 billion in the next five years in the U.S. are unchanged," the company statement reads. "Starbucks will continue to deepen its commitment to customers' food experience in stores, ensuring it surpasses their expectations, just as the company has done with coffee and beverages."
We need your support now more than ever. Can we count on you?
Comments
Post a comment
Sorry, but further commenting on this topic has been closed.