Research & Report Analysis Of Starbucks And Dunkin: America’s Favorite Coffee Chains

The most well-known coffee chains in the United States are Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts. Consumers are compelled to select between the two due to a variety of causes. It might be the food and drink selections as well as the rates, apps, and ambiance. These coffee-focused restaurant franchises have been in close competition for some years, competing for the title of coffee king.

We did a comparative analysis of these two largest coffee chains in the United States in this post. Several parameters were considered, including annual revenue, store locations, demographics, and search trends.

Brief Observations:

• Starbucks has more locations than Dunkin’ Donuts.
• Starbucks outlets are centered in metropolitan areas, while Dunkin’ Donuts stores are located in the Northeast.
• In comparison to Dunkin’, Starbucks has more revenue and growth in recent years.
• Starbucks is more popular than Dunkin’ Donuts in terms of trending searches.

Number Of Locations – Starbucks Vs. Dunkin

We observed a total 24,038 locations. Starbucks is a larger store with 14.7k stores across the nation compared to the nearby 9.4k Dunkin locations.

Total Number Of Locations From 2019 To 2021

The above line chart shows the number of stores from Q1 2019 to 2021. Starbucks is the store with the highest increase in the percentage of in-store locations during Q4 2019. Dunkin expanded many stores during the second quarter of 2019.

Starbucks will begin on a rapid expansion strategy that combines the physical and digital consumer experience. New Pickup locations are being opened in New York, California, and Washington.

Starbucks And Dunkin: Locations Per State

The coffee chain with the most locations in each state is depicted on the map above. In 37 states, Starbucks is the most popular coffee shop, whereas, in 13 states, Dunkin’ Donuts is the most popular.

Dunkin’ Donuts outranks Starbucks in all of the northeastern states, as well as Illinois and Florida, according to the statewide map.

Starbucks And Dunkin: Locations Per Country

The map above depicts the chain having the most locations in each country. Starbucks is the most popular coffee shop in 916 countries, while Dunkin’ Donuts is the most popular in 493 nations. In the United States, 54% of countries lack a Starbucks or Dunkin’ Donut’s location. There are 8 states in which Dunkin’ Donuts has the most stores per country, whereas Starbucks has the most stores per country in 11 states.

Locations Map Of Coffee Chain

The majority of Dunkin’ Donuts shops are on the east coast, while Starbuck cafes are centered in major cities. The maps below show the locations of each coffee chain’s locations around the country.

Number Of Locations VS Population

Starbucks has a disproportionately large number of stores in densely populated areas. The coffee chain tends to oversaturate the market and concentrate several urban areas.

On the other hand, Dunkin’ Donuts does not follow this pattern. The densely populated northeastern states of New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Connecticut have more Dunkin’ Donut’s locations.

It was discovered that a Dunkin’ Donuts outlet serves a greater population than Starbucks’. The majority of Dunkin’ Donuts locations are in areas where every other restaurant offers fewer than 200K people. This corroborates the fact that Dunkin’ has fewer locations in densely populated areas. Starbucks, on the other hand, has the majority of its locations in densely populated cities, where a restaurant may serve between 20k-30k people.

The number of Starbucks stores and population have an obvious linear relationship, but we didn’t confirm the same for Dunkin’. Instead, there have been a few outliers, such as a few densely populated states with a huge proportion of stores.

Annual Revenue

For a long time, there has been a famous brand competition between Dunkin’ Donuts and Starbucks. Starbucks has developed a higher-end brand than Dunkin’ Donuts, with a larger menu and more product personalization options. Dunkin’ Donuts offers more affordable prices, focused on the middle class.

Starbucks’ revenue increased significantly in 2017 as a result of store openings and comparative store sales growth. Dunkin’ Donuts has been steadily expanding throughout the years. The biggest notable increase was from $811 million to $1.25 billion between 2015 and 2016. Dunkin’ Brands has a 26 percent market share, with nearly all of its outlets being franchises.

How Does These Coffee Chains Popular On Google Search?

Google Trends is a useful tool for determining popular interest in a topic in a certain location over time. It commonly scales the values from 0 to 100 over a topic (maximum interest). Over the last year, the keywords Starbucks and Dunkin’ have been searched in the United States. The comparison of the two chains is depicted in the graph below.

The search interest for Starbucks was higher in comparison with Dunkin. Starbucks has a three-fold higher average search interest score than Dunkin’ Donuts.

Search Trends By State

The map below displays the trending search for Starbucks and Dunkin in every state:

Starbucks has more web searches in 44 states than Dunkin’ Donuts, while Dunkin’ Donuts is preferable in six states.

Then we ran a side-by-side map comparison to determine if the highest number of store locations and the search results were similar. The map on the left will depict the most famous brand in every state, while the map on the right side will show the brand with the most locations per state.

The big manufacturers and most researched brands are the same in 43 states across the United States. Dunkin’ is the most widely sought brand in the 7 states.

Coffee Trends And Store Expansions In 2021

Starbucks wants to increase the development of new formats including pickup and curbside, estimating that drive-thru would account for almost 45 % of its U.S. portfolio by 2023. Starbucks debuted its first-ever Pickup store a little over a year ago, and this expansion is expected to accelerate. The national launch of Dunkin’ Donuts’ menu simplification is now complete. This stage will assist to simplify things and provide a better client experience, as well as boost profits and delivery reliability. It’s all about convenience at Dunkin’ Donuts.

For instance, Dunkin Donuts launched its mobile order-ahead drive-thru in 2018, and its service has been essential in increasing off-premises business throughout the pandemic.

You can download the data used in this analysis, as well as other data, from our data repository if you want to learn more about store locations.

If you want to scrape data from Starbucks and Dunkin then contact Locationscloud today or ask for a free quote