Skip to Content

Dozens of Peet’s stores will close by month’s end

Several downtown locations of the Berkeley-born coffee chain will be impacted

The Peet’s at 595 Market St. is among the locations that will close this month. Photo: Olivia Peluso / Gazetteer SF

Peet’s Coffee will be closing roughly 27 locations across California by the end of this month, a company representative at its Emeryville headquarters confirmed Tuesday. 

There are 283 Peet’s locations nationwide including franchises, with 135 in the greater Bay Area alone. Employees of two Peet’s locations on Market Street, who said they were not allowed to speak on the matter, were notified of their stores’ impending closures last week. They said many of Peet’s downtown shops, with the exception of the Embarcadero location, are among those impacted. In a few of them, hiring signs are still posted in the window. 

The closures follow some major changes at the company. Last week, Keurig Dr. Pepper launched its $18 billion all-cash takeover of Peet’s parent company, JDE Peet’s. Keurig announced the buyout in August and, in October, raised $7 billion from private equity firms to finance the purchase. 

Peet’s was founded by Alfred Peet in Berkeley in 1966. In the ‘70s, Peet himself trained three young entrepreneurs — even providing them with roasted beans — for their new venture named Starbucks (maybe you’ve heard of it). Peet’s eventually went under the ownership of one of the Starbucks co-founders, Jerry Baldwin, who took the company public in 2001. Peet’s currently operates in Emeryville, with roasting in Alameda. 

Its parent company, Netherlands-based JDE Peet’s, was formed in 2019 from the merger of Dutch coffee and tea conglomerate Jacobs Douwe Egberts (JDE) and Peet’s Coffee and is now the world’s largest pure-play coffee company. The board of JDE Peet’s fully supported the takeover and unanimously recommended shareholders to accept the deal, Reuters reported last week. 

A reason for the closures was not given, nor did they comment on whether it was related to Keurig’s acquisition. 

Thanks for reading! If you liked this article, share it with someone. That’s the best way for new readers to discover Gazetteer SF.

More Stories

A Fan’s Notes: See you in Boohalla

The Valks are down, but definitely not out

October 29, 2026

Prop. D for Divisive

Is a measure that would make it harder to get future propositions onto the ballot a threat to democracy, or a return to legislative integrity?

October 29, 2026

How AI helps me live with aphasia

On World Stroke Day, the author of ‘Stroke of Genius’ explains how tools like ChatGPT gave him back his voice

October 29, 2026

Mandi House broke the curse

Yemeni hospitality, late night hours, and generous portions erase the memory of chronic closures at a Valencia Street storefront

October 28, 2026

Lurie heckled at D6 open house

‘We have to do better by you all,’ the mayor told vocal residents frustrated by crime, homelessness, and open drug use in their district

October 27, 2026