• USA Today, Monday, October 18, 2010 10:12 AM

A revamped Starbucks in Seattle's Capitol Hill area that serves regional wine, beer and cheeses -- on china, no less -- could be the prototype for a next generation of stores from the coffee retailer. It looks less like a Starbucks, which turns 40 next year, and more like a cafe that's been part of the neighborhood for years, Bruce Horovitz writes. And it will be green in more ways than the familiar logo.

"It's the biggest undertaking of design of any retailer in the world," Arthur Rubinfeld, global development chief at Starbucks, says of a play to implement energy efficiency and reuse old things to make new things. Each new company-owned store will be LEED certified. But the fact that the design doesn't scream Starbucks is also a serious gamble for a chain that has spent 40 years and billions of dollars establishing itself. Plus, what's with the alcohol?

"The idea of serving coffee all day to hype up consumers and alcohol at night to calm them down sounds like a perpetual motion machine," says Robert Thompson, pop-culture professor at Syracuse University. Not that there's anything wrong with that from a business standpoint: U.S. Starbucks stores currently get 70% of their business before 2 p.m.

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