In a bid to attract more consumers to its doors, the world’s largest coffee chain Starbucks Corp. announced on Monday that it will be offering unlimited use of wireless internet access (Wi-Fi) in all company-operated stores starting July 1.
Starbucks hopes to take back lucrative share of the restaurant business from its rivals like McDonald’s Corp. and other coffee chains that have long used free Wi-Fi connection to attract customers.
This time, Starbucks takes one step further by giving customers free Wi-Fi access, which will include special news networks and entertainment contents.
The Starbucks Digital Network was done in partnership with Yahoo, giving customers free access to online news websites like the Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Patch and USA Today as well as free music downloads on Apple iTune Stores.
Previously, Starbucks offered only two hours of free Internet access to each user everyday.
The company started implementing the earlier Wi-Fi scheme based on its study, which showed that customers login on the Internet in an average of one hour on each visit to Starbucks stores. Meanwhile, Smartphone users use Wi-Fi access on an average of 15 minutes.
The coffee giant hopes to extend its quarterly gains, which has been slumped for the past 13 quarters due to the recession and rapid expansion plans.
Starbucks also hopes to take back major market shares from McDonald’s, which has offered unlimited Wi-Fi access to some 11, 5000 stores. The coffee giant lost major clientele to McDonald’s due to its McCafe chain.
Following the announcement, Starbucks shares jumped by 1.5 percent or 41 cents ($27.56) during midday trading on Monday.
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