Best Starbucks Drinks Recommendations! Starbucks Coffee and Matcha Frappuccino Iced Tea - Better Than Coffee

Starbucks selling tea is old news by now. Since acquiring Teavana in 2012, the company has been bullish on the North American tea market. It rolled Teavana beverages into mainstream Starbucks stores, and in October 2013 opened four dedicated "Teavana Tea Bar" locations in the US — selling only tea, no coffee at all.

Tea Bars offered things regular Starbucks stores didn't: traditional Chinese and Western teas, innovative tea lattes, and light food, all in a calmer, gentler atmosphere — with prices slightly higher to match.

American consumers, however, hadn't developed a tea habit. To them, tea was optional in the way coffee is optional for many Asians. Between the premium prices and the strangeness of a Starbucks with no coffee, customers kept voting with their wallets for regular Starbucks. By 2016, all four Tea Bar locations had been converted into standard Starbucks stores or shut down.

Undeterred, Starbucks wondered whether tea specialty stores might work in Asia instead. In China, the bet looked promising: after introducing Teavana iced shaken teas, tea bags, and tea-based Frappuccinos, Chinese customers were actually buying more tea than coffee at Starbucks.

But by 2016, when Starbucks weighed bringing Teavana Tea Bar to China, the market had already filled with homegrown new-style tea brands. The concept was eliminated before it ever landed.

China was out — but Japan remained. Japanese demand for tea is enormous, and young consumers were embracing new-style tea drinks. Perhaps wary of repeating the no-coffee backlash, Starbucks hedged: in 2020 it opened three Starbucks Tea & Cafe stores focused on specialty tea beverages, but with a limited coffee menu alongside, at friendlier tea prices.

On the flavor front, Starbucks read Japanese youth perfectly, launching the Yuzu Citrus Lavender Sage Tea Frappuccino, Yuzu Citrus Lavender Sage Tea, Strawberry Passion Fruit Tea, Strawberry Passion Fruit Frappuccino, Shioan (salted) Matcha Latte, and Japanese Charcoal Roasted Tea Latte. Knowing young people photograph everything, every dine-in tea came in transparent cups to show off the layered, photogenic look.

This time, the market read was right. Starbucks Tea & Cafe took off. But with all three initial stores in the Kanto region, people in Kansai were left envious — so Starbucks opened its fourth Tea & Cafe in Osaka on February 25, 2022.

The tea-store business may have stumbled early, but Starbucks never lost its appetite for tea. Howard Schultz originally banned coffee products outright from Teavana tea bars; reality eventually forced a compromise. The lesson: however much demand for new-style tea grows, and however ambitious Starbucks is about the tea market, the brand can't fully separate itself from coffee. Say "Starbucks" and people think coffee — selling only tea would feel like betraying the brand.

Image Source: Internet

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Matcha and milk drinks have their charms, but for a latte built on real espresso, the beans matter. FrontStreet Coffee's Premium Blend — Brazilian Cerrado paired with washed Colombian Huila — delivers the classic almond, hazelnut, and dark chocolate profile that shines through milk, with crema worthy of any café counter.

For a fruit-forward twist reminiscent of those Frappuccinos, the Strawberry Candy Espresso Blend brings rose, dried blueberry, and candy sweetness that pairs beautifully with milk or ice, while the natural FrontStreet Hua Kui offers tropical passion fruit and strawberry aromatics for those who prefer their "better than coffee" drinks made from actual coffee.