Downtown Springfield: Starbucks Coffee inside former Bistro Market to close

The Starbucks Coffee inside the downtown Springfield's former Bistro Market is shutting down, according to a sign posted on the door Thursday.

"This Starbucks location will close on Jan. 27, 2020," the notice read.

It directed customers to visit the Starbucks inside the Price Cutter at St. Louis Street and National Avenue.

Officials with Pyramid Foods, which operates the Price Cutter at 1260 E. St. Louis St., could not immediately be reached for comment.

A social media post tied to a staffer at the shop said he was "laid off" Thursday. The staffer did not respond to a News-Leader request for comment.

Rusty Worley, executive director with Downtown Springfield Association, said he expected that the Starbucks brand will find its way back into downtown.

"I think it'll be a short-term scenario," he said, referring to the exit of Starbucks from downtown.

Morris Dock, who owns the building where the Starbucks is located, told the News-Leader in 2017 that Pyramid Foods' lease on the approximately 11,000-square-foot market runs through May 2020.

Worley, with Downtown Springfield Association, said he believes Starbucks' agreement with Pyramid ends prior to that time.

Worley also noted that Classic Rock Coffee, a locally based chain, expects to open in the Brewery District Flats building at 535 W. Walnut St. sometime in February. A sandwich shop is expected to also open in that building, Worley said, taking the place of a hot dog shop that recently moved to Nixa.

Classic Rock Coffee would join a highly saturated marketplace with local cafes including MudHouse Coffee, The Coffee Ethic, European Cafe and Kingdom Coffee, all of which sell espresso drinks within blocks of each other in the Park Central area.

The move to close the Starbucks was the latest in a string of business setbacks for attempts to operate a grocery store, liquor store or coffee concept in the commercial building on the southwestern corner of South Avenue and Walnut Street, part of the core of downtown.

In August 2010, Bistro Market opened in the 401 South Ave. space, formerly an upscale furniture shop. The News-Leader reported a month later that it would be the city's "first urban market." It included a wide range of groceries, gourmet prepared foods, liquor, a Starbucks and other amenities.

At first, hopes were high. Company officials said in September 2010 that the 10,000-square-foot store "exceeded expectations." One executive said at the time that he believed the shop could earn $10 million in annual sales, more than the $4 million originally estimated.

But Bistro Market never took off in the local market. In 2015, Price Cutter officials said the downtown grocery store would become "a more intimate setting for a liquor store" and moved its grocery operations to the St. Louis Street Price Cutter, formerly a Dillon's supermarket.

But since then, the Bistro Market space dropped the liquor sales. In 2017, the store closed abruptly, the News-Leader reported, but the Starbucks shop remained.

In 2018, a plan to turn the space into a Scandinavian-style "food hall" was announced but sputtered out due to the costs of renovating the space.

Gregory Holman is the investigative reporter for the News-Leader. Email news tips to gholman@gannett.com and consider supporting vital local journalism by subscribing. Learn more by visiting News-Leader.com/subscribe.