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Brian Niccol Says Starbucks Is Back. Pumpkin Spice Season Will Tell.

Two years in, the former Chipotle chief has four straight quarters of sales growth, but margins, unionized baristas and squeezed loyalty members still stand between him and a finished turnaround.

As pumpkin spice latte season reaches its peak, Chipotle’s former boss Brian Niccol—who became CEO of Starbucks just over two years ago—said the global coffee chain has successfully returned to its roots. “We’ve figured out how to get back to connecting with customers,” Niccol said in a press release on Sept. 10, citing “tremendous progress” in the Back to Starbucks campaign he launched at the start of his tenure. But Starbucks’ peak season, which begins with the fall PSL and extends into winter with Red Cup Day and its holiday beverage line, will serve as the ultimate stress test for his operational vision.

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Niccol’s core goal of reestablishing Starbucks as the community coffeehouse it once was isn’t out of reach. “People love a good turnaround story,” Chris Ribeiro, founder of retail analytics firm Starlight Analytics and assistant professor at Rutgers Business........

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