Starbucks to moves its European head office to London from Amsterdam, increasing amount of tax company pays in UK
Nevin Barich
LONDON and STOCKHOLM
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April 16, 2014
(Bloomberg LP)
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Starbucks Corp., the world’s biggest coffee chain, said it will move its European head office to London from Amsterdam, increasing the amount of tax it pays in the U.K. following a row over the matter last year.
The move will concentrate “a modest number” of senior executives in the U.K. capital, with some being transferred from Amsterdam, Seattle-based Starbucks said today by e-mail. It will mean the company pays more tax in the U.K., it also said.
The coffee chain said last year it would pay 10 million pounds ($16.8 million) of U.K. corporation tax in both 2013 and 2014. The payments came amid criticism levied at the company by U.K. lawmakers and activist groups over complex accounting methods used to minimize its British tax burden.
Starbucks -- which opened its first European stores in 1998 -- said the U.K. is its largest and fastest-growing market in Europe. Shifting the regional head office to London will enable management to better oversee its business in the country, where it plans to open more than 100 outlets this year.
The openings will create 1,000 permanent jobs in Britain, where Starbucks already has more than 7,500 employees.
“This move speaks for itself,” Kris Engskov, head of Starbucks Europe, Middle East and Africa, said in the statement. “London is the perfect place to grow our European business.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Paul Jarvis in London at pjarvis@bloomberg.net; Katarina Gustafsson in Stockholm at kgustafsson@bloomberg.net To contact the editors responsible for this story: Celeste Perri at cperri@bloomberg.net Paul Jarvis
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