Chandigarh, July 9, 2020: Starbucks, the world’s leading coffee chain has opened doors to its first Drive-Thru Café in the country. The DriveThru store is located at Dhillon Plaza, Zirakpur, Punjab, a development owned by the Dhillon Group.
Traditionally the drive-thru model has been very successful for fast food chains like McDonald’s, Burger King & KFC providing great incremental sales for these companies and at the same time providing convenience to the customers.
This is especially true during the ongoing Covid-19 situation around the globe where there were restrictions put in place by governments barring customers to dine in, thereby making customers to take-away their orders.
In such circumstances DriveThru stores offer the customers the perfect setting by allowing them to take-away their order by sitting within the safety of their vehicle using the drive-thru lane.
Karan Dhillon, principal of the Dhillon Group and owner/developer of the project said he always believed in partnering with the best global brands and it has been a pleasure working with the Starbucks India team.
“We have always believed in having an entrepreneurial spirit and capturing the first mover advantage such as setting up ‘Dhillon Fun Republic’ Chandigarh in 2003 which was North India’s First Integrated Shopping Mall/Multiplex or setting up Burger King’s First Drive Thru in India back in 2016.
The Starbucks Drive-thru project is truly special for us seeing the timing of its opening during the ongoing Covid-19 crisis, which clearly shows the group’s commitment, dedication and focus towards completing and delivering their projects on time even in difficult periods,” he said.
The Dhillon group owns properties having international brands like McDonalds, Burger King, Dominos, Decathlon, Cinepolis Cinemas, INOX etc. and have setup Drive-Thru restaurants for some of these brands at their Shopping Malls/Multiplex developments.
“We are excited to introduce Starbucks’ first drive-thru in India at Dhillon Plaza, Zirakpur, Chandigarh. It is a state-of-the-art facility with best in class design and state of the art features.
We look forward to opening doors of this brand-new format store at Chandigarh for our customers to experience their favourite Starbucks coffee. We are delighted to partner with Karan Dhillon and his team to bring this innovation to India,” said Tata Starbucks India CEO Navin Gurnaney.
The store is a multi-storey format with dine-in on both floor and drive-thru pick up points on the outside. Customers can also stop for a quick break to enjoy their Starbucks favorites in the café, with two levels of in-store seating, free Wi-Fi, and Starbucks merchandise available for purchase,” said Siddharth Agarwal, Head, Business Development, Tata Starbucks India.
Starbucks in India has a 50:50 joint venture with Tata Global Beverages called TATA STARBUCKS LTD. and it operates outlets branded “Starbucks, A Tata Alliance”.
They have a pan India presence in multiple states and are expanding at a rapid pace and plan to open more Drive-Thru stores in India.