5/5 Nabeel Isa A. 4 years ago on Google
Great
Atmosphere
were
in
🇧🇭
Caribou
Coffee
founder,
John
Puckett,
was
working
as
a management
consultant for Boston-based
firm Bain
&
Company,
helping
develop
ideas
and
strategies
for
other
companies,
when
he
decided
he
wanted
to
become
an
entrepreneur.
After
a
trip
to Denali
National
Park in Alaska,
he
and
his
wife,
Kim,
decided
to
raise
money
and
start
a
coffee
company.
His
wife
stayed
with
a
job
at General
Motors while
John
moved
to Minnesota to
find
the
first
site
and
put
together
financing.
The
initial
concept
for
Caribou
was
a
five-day-a-week
schedule
aimed
at
downtown
office
workers,
mimicking
what
worked
in
Boston.
Puckett
signed
a
lease
for
the
first
location
to
be
in
the
large Pillsbury
Center office
building.
However,
soon
afterward
the
building's
landlord
decided
not
to
sign
the
lease,
because
another
of
the
building's
retail
tenants
had
exclusive
rights
to
selling
coffee
in
the
building
and
had
threatened
to
sue
them.
As
a
result,
the
financing
for
the
store
fell
through
because
it
was
dependent
on
that
specific
site.
Puckett
opted
to
start
looking
for
an
available
location
in
the
suburbs,
and
the
first
Caribou
Coffee
shop
was
started
in Edina,
Minnesota,
a
suburb
of Minneapolis,
in
December
1992.
In
2006 Arcapita (formerly
known
as
First
Islamic
Investment
Bank)
was
Caribou
Coffee's
majority
shareholder.[7] In
2002, Yusuf
al-Qaradawi's involvement
with
the
bank
led
to
a
protest
of
Caribou
Coffee.
That
same
year
al-Qaradawi
stepped
down
as
chairman
of
the
bank's Sharia Board.
As
of
2009,
Caribou
employed
more
than
6,000
people.
In
December
2012,
it
was
taken
private
in
a
$340
million
deal
by
German
equity
company JAB
Holding
Company.
In
May
2013,
Caribou
Coffee
announced
plans
to
close
80
stores
in
Ohio,
Michigan,
Pennsylvania,
Washington
D.C.,
Maryland,
Virginia,
Georgia,
Illinois
and
Eastern
Wisconsin,
with
88
others
in
those
locations
to
be
converted
to Peet's
Coffee
&
Tea during
2013–2014.
Caribou
locations
would
remain
open
in California, Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri,
North
Carolina,
North
Dakota,
Nebraska,
Ohio,
Oklahoma,
South
Dakota,
Virginia,
Wisconsin,
Wyoming,
and
ten
international
markets.