By Friday afternoon, the Starbucks at 350 Bay Street had already locked its doors. A letter taped to the glass told customers that “this week, we made the very difficult decision to close this Starbucks location.”
A short walk away at Church and Wellesley, baristas were still pulling shots behind a rainbow chalkboard that read “Welcome to Church & Wellesley.” The same standard letter was on their front door.
Almost exactly a year after Starbucks closed 13 Toronto stores in one weekend, the chain is doing it again. Four Toronto locations are closing this week, three of them downtown. Across Canada, 19 Starbucks stores show no hours after Saturday, Sept. 26, on the company’s store locator, in Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta.
Toronto locations closing this week
- 350 Bay Street, 350 Bay St., Toronto, ON M5H 2S6. Already closed
- 485 Church at Wellesley, 485 Church St., Toronto, ON M4Y 2C6. Last day: Saturday, Sept. 26 (until 9:30 p.m.)
- Portland & Adelaide, 123 Portland St., Toronto, ON M5V 2N4. Last day: Saturday, Sept. 26 (until 8 p.m.)
- Yonge & Erskine, 2451 Yonge St., Toronto, ON M4P 2E7. Last day: Saturday, Sept. 26 (until 9 p.m.)
6ix Retail visited the three downtown stores on Friday and found closure notices posted at each one. Yonge & Erskine shows no hours after Saturday on the Starbucks store locator. The full Canadian list is further down.
A second round of closures
Starbucks announced this week that it will close 250 stores across North America, the second big round of closures under Chairman and CEO Brian Niccol, who joined the company in 2024. Last September, the company closed 627 stores in North America and Europe.
In a letter to employees, Chief Operating Officer Mike Grams said the stores being closed either aren’t delivering acceptable financial results or can’t provide the experience Starbucks wants for customers and employees. The company hasn’t said which reason applies to any specific store, and a representative told Daily Hive that Starbucks will not disclose how many Canadian stores are affected.
At the stores, the message to customers is a one-page letter signed “The Starbucks Coffee Company.” It thanks customers for being “part of our story,” says the company is “working closely to support our partners through this transition,” and includes a QR code to find another nearby café.
What we saw on Friday
350 Bay Street
This Financial District store sits on Bay Street just south of Temperance Street, a short walk from the PATH and from Old City Hall. It served office workers from 5:30 a.m. on weekdays.
It closed a day earlier than the other Toronto stores. By Friday afternoon the doors were locked, though the black awnings, siren logo and vertical Starbucks banner were all still up. Starbucks partners were inside, surrounded by chairs on tables and discussing next steps with each other.
On the store locator, it’s the only one of the four with no Saturday hours.
485 Church at Wellesley
This store is at the centre of the Church Street strip, between The Well Bar and Craig’s Cookies, with a curbside patio out front. It has been a fixture in the Village for years, and neighbours have spoken up for it before. In 2024, when it moved toward takeout, members of the Church Wellesley Village community said they were losing a daytime gathering place (blogTO).
On Friday it was business as usual inside. Baristas were working the bar behind the hand-lettered rainbow welcome sign, Starbucks Reserve branding lined the back wall, and a sandwich board on the sidewalk was still promoting the fall pecan latte. The letter on the door said the store would close “by the end of this week.”
It keeps the latest hours of the four Toronto stores and will serve its last customers at 9:30 p.m. on Saturday.
Portland & Adelaide (123 Portland Street)
This store takes up the ground-floor corner of a newer residential building at Portland and Adelaide, with tall windows facing the Adelaide Street bike lanes. It sits in the middle of King West’s condo and office district.
On Friday, customers were still sitting inside by the windows and there was a lineup of regulars, most pausing at the notice on the door. The hours card still lists service seven days a week, right next to the letter that has become a sad sight to 40+ Starbucks locations in the city over the last two years.
The store was hiring as recently as August, when a barista posting for store #83743, Portland & Adelaide, was listed on Workopolis.
Yonge & Erskine
The fourth Toronto store is in midtown, at 2451 Yonge Street, just north of Eglinton Avenue. 6ix Retail did not have time to visit it today, but the Starbucks store locator lists it as open until 9 p.m. on Saturday and closed every day after.
Closures across Canada
Starbucks hasn’t released a list of Canadian closures. 6ix Retail checked the Starbucks store locator on Sept. 25 and found 19 locations, including the four Toronto stores above, that show regular hours through Saturday, Sept. 26, and “Closed” every day after that. The three stores we visited all matched this pattern and had closure notices on their doors. We have not visited the others, and a store can also go dark on the locator for a temporary closure such as a renovation. We’ll update this list as closures are confirmed.
Ontario has 12 of the 19, including two each in Ottawa and London. British Columbia has five, three of them in downtown Vancouver, and Alberta has two.
All closing times are for the final day, Saturday, Sept. 26.
Ontario (plus the four Toronto stores above)
- Leslie & St. John’s Sideroad E, 10 Melvin Robson Ave., Aurora, ON L4G 4B8 (until 9:30 p.m.)
- 81 Metcalfe Street, 81 Metcalfe St., Ottawa, ON K1P 6K7 (until 6 p.m.)
- Beechwood & Mackay, 409 MacKay St., Ottawa, ON K1M 2C5 (until 7 p.m.)
- 601 Richmond St, 601 Richmond St., London, ON N6A 3G2 (until 8 p.m.)
- 944 Hamilton Road, 944 Hamilton Rd., London, ON N5W 1A1 (until 9 p.m.)
- 151 York Boulevard, 151 York Blvd., Hamilton, ON L8R 3L4 (until 9 p.m.)
- 2139 Huron Church Road, 2139 Huron Church Rd., Windsor, ON N9C 2L8 (until 4 p.m.)
- Boundary & 401, 1400 Boundary Rd., Cornwall, ON K6H 7P8 (until 7 p.m.)
British Columbia
- Metropolitan Towers, 960 Seymour St., Vancouver, BC V6B 3L9 (until 6 p.m.)
- Pacific Blvd & Davie/Concord, 125 Davie St., Vancouver, BC V6Z 2Y1 (until 6 p.m.)
- 891 Dunsmuir, 885 Dunsmuir St., Vancouver, BC V6C 1N5 (until 6 p.m.)
- Lougheed & Holdom, 2201 Holdom Ave., Burnaby, BC V5B 0A2 (until 7:30 p.m.)
- United Boulevard & Schooner St, 1988 United Blvd., Coquitlam, BC V3K 6Z1 (until 6 p.m.)
Alberta
- Beacon Hill (Sarcee & 112th Ave), 11646 Sarcee Trail NW, Calgary, AB T3R 0A1 (until 8:30 p.m.)
- 50th Street Market, 4865 167 Ave. NW, Edmonton, AB T5Y 0S4 (until 9 p.m.)
Closing some stores, redesigning others
The closures were announced a day after Starbucks said it had finished redesigns, which it calls “uplifts,” at more than 1,000 coffeehouses across the U.S. and Canada since late 2025. The company plans to reach at least 1,500 by the end of its fiscal year on Sept. 30 and to speed up further in 2027. Starbucks says uplifts are underway in Toronto, Vancouver and Calgary, though it hasn’t said which locations.
The redesigns add softer seating, artwork, greenery and local design touches, meant to get customers to stay longer. They’re part of a wider set of changes under the company’s “Back to Starbucks” plan, including a new service model called Green Apron Service, ceramic mugs and glassware for customers who stay, the return of condiment bars and more power outlets.
So even as it closes stores, Starbucks is steering customers back toward sitting down. Grams said the company is still committed to growing its store count in North America, where it had 18,371 locations at the end of June.
A year later: the running tally
These closures add to a long retreat from downtown Toronto. In September 2025, Starbucks closed 13 Toronto stores, including Commerce Court, Adelaide & Peter and Richmond & Spadina. In early 2021, 29 Toronto locations closed in a single wave.
Across all three rounds, that’s 46 Toronto closures in under six years, most of them downtown.
Dustin Fuhs is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of 6ix Retail, Toronto’s premier source for retail and hospitality industry news. As the former Editor-in-Chief of Retail Insider, Canada’s most-read retail trade publication, Dustin brings over two decades of expertise spanning retail, marketing, entertainment and hospitality sectors. His experience includes roles with industry giants such as The Walt Disney Company, The Hockey Hall of Fame, The Canadian Opera Company, Starbucks Canada and Blockbuster.
Recognized as a RETHINK Retail Top Retail Expert in 2024, 2025 and 2026, Dustin delivers insider perspectives on Toronto’s evolving retail landscape, from emerging brands to established players reshaping the city’s commercial districts.