Starbucks selects Adyen to handle payments in over 940 stores across Europe

The Dutch payment platform Adyen has implemented its payment infrastructure in 943 Starbucks cafes in the UK, Austria, and Switzerland, supported by 2,375 payment terminals. The multi-market implementation builds on the existing partnership between Adyen and Alsea, a Starbucks franchisee, for which Adyen already processed payments in Mexico.

Starbucks' migration to the Adyen platform went exceptionally smoothly. In just seven weeks, the solution was implemented in 900 locations. At the peak of the expansion, the Adyen and Starbucks teams launched 125 stores in a single week. Importantly, the migration was carried out during standard business hours, without disrupting the daily operations of the coffee shops or affecting the customer experience.

To date, Adyen has processed sales of over 20 million cups of Starbucks coffee in these markets. Feedback from the teams working in the coffee shops—known as Green Apron Partners—has been very positive. The new system is considered faster and more intuitive to use.

The Adyen platform also supports payments at Starbucks Reserve Roastery in Milan, the brand's flagship Italian location. The expansion of the collaboration is the result of a partnership that began with pilot projects and has since become a key element of Starbucks' European payment strategy.

One of the pillars of the collaboration is the implementation of the "Store and Forward" feature, which ensures reliability in offline mode. This solution allows payments to be accepted even in the event of network failures or connectivity issues, ensuring uninterrupted customer service. Since August 2025, this technology has secured more than 45,000 Starbucks transactions in these three countries that would otherwise have been rejected due to WiFi issues.

"Starbucks operates on a massive scale, where every second of system availability matters," said Alexa von Bismarck, President EMEA at Adyen. "The transition to a single, unified payment platform has simplified store operations while increasing system resilience to serve customers without interruption. From rapid deployment across hundreds of locations to built-in offline reliability, this collaboration demonstrates how modern payment infrastructure can directly protect revenue and enhance the in-store experience."

"At Starbucks, the quality of our coffee and service is at the heart of everything we do, so our technology must be equally reliable," said John Elliott, VP of Technology EMEA at Starbucks. "Our partnership with Adyen ensures that our payment technology is as robust as our service. With this stability, our teams can focus on our guests and the coffee they love, without technical disruptions."