Your caffeine buzz could come quicker under Starbucks’ new leadership. The coffee chain, which is beloved by millions of java drinkers worldwide, has gotten in hot water with customers having to wait a while for their cup of joe.
But Brian Niccol, Starbucks’ new CEO, wants to get a cup of coffee in customers’ hands much faster than before.
“My hope is we can get you a brewed cup of coffee in less than 30 seconds,” Niccol told ABC’s Good Morning America in an interview that aired on Thursday. “You’re going to have an experience where when you walk in and you interact with the barista, it’s going to be really quick for that brewed cup of coffee.”
That may come as a shock to Starbucks customers who have become accustomed to longer wait times—with some waiting 15 minutes to 30 minutes for their orders, according to September data from marketing consultancy Technomic.
Starbucks didn’t immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment on what the average wait time at the coffee chain currently is.
Some reports suggest the long wait times are due to understaffing and a lack of reliable equipment. In fact, some orders were taking so long that the company’s second-quarter results were hurt due to customers canceling orders rather than waiting for them to be fulfilled.
“Customers using [mobile order and pay] put items into their cart and sometimes chose not to complete their order, citing long wait times of product and availability,” then-Starbucks CEO Laxman Narasimhan said during the company’s Q2 earnings call in May.
Just months later in August, Starbucks announced Narasimhan would leave the company and be replaced by Niccol, who was poached from Chipotle.
Previously, Niccol had said the magic wait time for customers would be at or under four minutes.
“The less than four minutes actually comes from two things: one, talking to baristas and customers to find out what are their expectations,” Niccol said during the company’s Q4 earnings call in late October. “And one of the things I’m happy to discover is, before the business got as big as it is…a lot of long-time partners are used to getting these handcrafted drinks done in about 2.5 minutes. So we know it’s feasible.”
While it may seem like a feat to get drink delivery time down to just 30 seconds, Bob Vergidis, chief vision officer of pointofsale.cloud, a point-of-sale system for multi-unit restaurants, told Fortune it’s “absolutely possible.”
“Achieving this goal would rely more on automation and advanced equipment rather than significant staffing increases,” said Vergidis, who also sits on the advisory board of the Interactive Customer Experience Association. “For instance, there are rapid-brew, bean-to-cup machines capable of brewing an 8-to-10 oz. cup of high-quality coffee in 35-to-40 seconds.”
Other changes coming at Starbucks
Niccol also has a vision for improving the mobile ordering process.
“I think what you’re going to see is a very orderly mobile order business with its own dedicated pickup area,” Niccol said during the GMA interview.
This could help address one major frustration for Starbucks customers of “waiting behind complex orders when they only want a simple brewed coffee,” Vergidis said. “Introducing express lanes or express self-service kiosks—similar to those in grocery stores—could address this bottleneck.”
Niccol also said the company is investing in building a technology that will give customers an exact time that their order will be ready.
“Today, you know, we just kind of give you an estimate, ‘hey, it’ll be ready in three to five minutes,’” Niccol said in the GMA interview. “In the future, what’ll happen is we’ll be like, ‘Rebecca, your drink will be ready at nine,’ instead of it just being made, sitting on the counter [and] waiting for people to come.”
Although some operational inefficiencies have gotten in Starbucks’ way, the company has shown improvement in some other areas. A Starbucks spokesperson previously told Fortune a feedback survey from employees shows consistent improvement in job satisfaction metrics like getting the hours they want to work and earning competitive pay, which averages about $15 per hour in the U.S., according to Indeed.
Starbucks’ third-quarter earnings report also showed employee turnover is the lowest it’s been since the pandemic, and the rate of shift completion is the highest it’s been in the past two years.
Starbucks customers also have a nostalgic operations change to look forward to: they’re “bringing back the Sharpies,” for cup personalizations, Niccol told GMA.
