Starbucks locations serve hot and cold beverages, whole-bean coffee, microground instant coffee, full-leaf teas, pastries, and snacks. Most stores also sell packaged food items, hot and cold sandwiches, and items such as mugs andtumblers. Starbucks Evenings locations also offer a variety of beers, wines, and appetizers after 4pm.[3] Through the Starbucks Entertainment division and Hear Music brand, the company also markets books, music, and film. Many of the company's products are seasonal or specific to the locality of the store. Starbucks-brand ice cream and coffee are also offered at grocery stores.
From Starbucks' founding in 1971 as a Seattle coffee bean roaster and retailer, the company has expanded rapidly. Since 1987, Starbucks has opened on average two new stores every day.[4] Starbucks had been profitable as a local company in Seattle in the early 1980s [5] but lost money on its late 1980s expansion into the Midwest and British Columbia. Its fortunes did not reverse until 1990 when it registered a small profit. By the time it expanded into California in 1991 it had become trendy.[6] The first store outside the United States or Canada opened in the mid-1990s, and overseas stores now constitute almost one third of Starbucks' stores.[7] The company planned to open a net of 900 new stores outside of the United States in 2009,[8] but has announced 300 store closures in the United States since