Starbucks Middle East to cut 2,000 jobs amid Gaza row

STARBUCKS’ Middle Eastern franchisee is to lay off thousands of workers as boycotts linked to the war in Gaza cause a downturn in sales.

Alshaya Group, the Kuwait-headquartered company that owns the rights to Starbucks in the Middle East, plans to cut more than 2,000 staff, equivalent to 4pc of its workforce, amid “difficult trading conditions” since the Oct 7 attacks.

Alshaya operates around 2,000 Starbucks outlets across 13 countries in the Middle East, North Africa and central Asia. It also holds licences to operate franchises for brands including Boots, Jo Malone and Estée Lauder.

Starbucks told investors in January that it was seeing a “significant impact on traffic and sales” in the Middle East amid calls to boycott the company for its alleged support for Israel. Shares in the company have dropped by almost 12pc over the past year.

A spokesman for Alshaya said: “As a result of the continually challenging trading conditions over the last six months, we have taken the sad and very difficult decision to reduce the number of colleagues in our Starbucks MENA [Middle East and North Africa] stores.

“We will ensure that we give our colleagues leaving the business, and their families, the support they need, and we would like to express thanks for their hard work and dedication to Alshaya Group and the Starbucks brand.”

A Starbucks spokesman added: “Our thoughts are with the green apron partners who will be leaving, and we want to thank them for their contributions.”

It comes after Starbucks and the trade union representing its US workers sued each other in October in a dispute over a pro-palestinian social media post. Starbucks Workers United shared a post on Twitter which read “Solidarity with Palestine”, just days after the Hamas attacks on Israel on Oct 7.

The café-chain sued the union for trademark infringement, demanding that it change its name and stop using a circular green logo. The action prompted Starbucks Workers United to countersue the coffee chain for allegedly defaming the union by suggesting that it supports terrorism and violence.

Starbucks and Starbucks Workers United have since resolved all litigation.

In a letter to staff in December, its chief executive, Laxman Narasimhan, said: “Cities around the world have seen escalating protests. Many of our stores have experienced incidents of vandalism. We see protests influenced by misrepresentation on social media of what we stand for.”