Dutch Bros eyes former Starbucks site for first Seattle drive-thru
Dutch Bros could take over a former Starbucks in SODO, setting up its first Seattle drive-thru inside the company's hometown market. Starbucks closed the site in a 2025 overhaul that cut about 900 jobs.
Permits filed last month tied Dutch Bros Coffee to 4115 4th Ave S in SODO, a former Starbucks site that closed in 2025. If the project moves ahead, it would give Dutch Bros its first drive-thru in Seattle proper, landing a direct rival inside Starbucks' hometown market and near the company headquarters in Seattle.
The address had belonged to Starbucks' SoDo Reserve store before the company shut it down in September 2025. Starbucks also closed its Capitol Hill Reserve Roastery that same month as part of a broader restructuring plan that eliminated about 900 jobs and closed about 1% of its North American locations. The company said it expected to end fiscal 2025 with about 18,300 North American stores, down from 18,734 as of June 29, 2025.
That round of closures hit Seattle especially hard because one of the stores sat in SODO, where Starbucks has long concentrated its corporate footprint. The decision sparked employee and union backlash, including a rally outside Starbucks headquarters in Seattle, where Starbucks Workers United and allies framed the cuts as another sign that the company was willing to shrink in its own backyard.
Dutch Bros is entering that gap with a very different operating model. The chain says it has 73 locations in Washington state and describes itself as a drive-thru coffee company, with order-ahead available through its app. That format shifts the job toward speed, throughput and window service, putting more pressure on the labor at the speaker and the drive-thru lane than on café seating or a slower in-store experience.
For Starbucks workers in Seattle and beyond, the site on 4th Avenue South is a reminder that closures can quickly become openings for competitors that are built around a faster, drive-thru-heavy pace. In a city where Starbucks is still the dominant name, Dutch Bros would not just be taking a vacant storefront. It would be moving into a market shaped by layoffs, store cuts and a labor fight that has made every closure feel bigger than one address.
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