Caribou Coffee Closing, Some Reopening as Peet's Coffee & Tea

Rumors running rampant on the Internet are partially true: Caribou Coffee locations in Ohio will close.  Some locations, however, will reopen as Peet's Coffee & Tea locations, marking the company's entrance into the Ohio market.

An employee at the Avon Caribou Coffee location said management learned on April 5 via a conference call that all Ohio locations will close down, although some will re-open as a Peet’s Coffee & Tea locations.

A manager at the Westlake location said that the Detroit Road location will close on April 14 at noon. She would not give any additional information, including whether or not the store would be reopening.

The Avon employee said the Westlake location would be closed permanently.   

According to the Avon employee, the Avon location in the Commons will remain open until the summer before closing down for three weeks and re-opening as a Peet’s coffeehouse.  A source at the Lakewood location said the Lakewood store will close and re-open as a Peet's.

There are also locations in Tower City, Beachwood, Solon and Rocky River.

Employees in Illinois have taken to Facebook to say several of that state's locations would also close and reopen as Peet's.

In December of 2012, German conglomerate Joh. A. Benckiser Group said it would be buying the publicly traded Minneapolis-based Caribou Coffee Co. for $340 million. Earlier in the year it bought Peet’s Coffee & Tea for $1 billion.

Peet’s Coffee was founded in Berkeley, CA, and is now headquartered in Emeryville, CA. The bulk of its stores are located in California. The company also maintains stores in Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, Oregon and Washington state.

According to Caribou Coffee’s website, there are 32 locations in Ohio.