Regional News: Dutch Bros Expanding to Phoenix, AZ

One of Oregon’s most well-known brands moves 40% of support workers to Phoenix

By Brandon Brown – Reporter, Phoenix Business Journal

Jan 17, 2024

Drive-thru coffee giant Dutch Bros Inc. announced Jan. 17 it will be expand its corporate offices to Phoenix.

In doing so, it plans to move 40% of its total support staff, or hundreds, or workers out of its Grants Pass home to Arizona. The company (NYSE: BROS) said it is looking to significantly grow its presence in the Phoenix area.

The moves, set to take place by Jan. 1, 2025, arrive after Christine Barone took over as CEO. Barone told the PBJ she planned to split her time between Oregon and Arizona. Barone also said the company does not plan to move its headquarters to Arizona altogether.

The Phoenix office will be the company’s national support center and employees there will support day-to-day operations. Barone said as Dutch Bros grows, having an office in Phoenix will keep the coffee chain’s support center closer to the brand’s center of gravity.

“As we head towards 4,000 shops, we are expanding rapidly towards the east, and so the most important thing we do at our support centers and at our headquarters every day is to support our shops,” Barone told the PBJ. “And so just thinking through with that expansion, we plan to actually open in Florida this year, the further east that we have really gone so far to date.

“And with that, just having kind of really easy access to our shops to support our teams and our operators and things like that, and then also having really easy access back and forth between the Medford airport and Phoenix, it’s one of those places where it’s really like a hub between Medford and the rest of the rest of the country and the rest of our shops.”

Barone, in a release, also said the move “positions us to compete for the talent we need to accomplish this ambitious goal.”

Travis Boersma, co-founder and executive chairman, said in the same release that Grants Pass contributed to the company’s success.

“Dutch Bros will continue to be connected to the community in a meaningful way through our roasting facility, HQ offices, the shops that operate in the area, and our local givebacks,” Boersma said.

The company said in early 2023 it hoped to reach the $1 billion sales mark. Dutch Bros reported $264 million in third quarter 2023 revenue.

The 4,000-shop figure cited by Barone is significantly higher than the goal of reaching 800 shops cited by Joth Ricci early last year.

Dutch Bros went public in 2022. The company traded between $27 and $28 Wednesday, below its 52-week high of $41.44 and just above its 52-week low of $22.67.

Barone, who recently took over the role of CEO after being the president of Dutch Bros for the past year, is a Phoenix native and formerly served as CEO of True Food Kitchen, which is based in Phoenix.

Andy Giegerich and Demi Lawrence also contributed to this story.