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Looks like Starbucks isn’t coming back to its most famous Tokyo location

Casey Baseel Mar 16, 2024
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But there will still be a place to grab a drink while looking at the great view of the Shibuya scramble, maybe in the company of giant anime figures.

Back in November, the QFront building in Tokyo’s Shibuya neighborhood closed. The QFront name might not mean much to most people, but just about anyone who’s ever been to Shibuya can form a mental image of the building since it had Tokyo’s most famous Starbucks branch.

The Starbucks branch was sandwiched between floors taken up by QFront’s primary occupant, Tsutaya, and the company’s video/CD rental shop and bookstore. These days the physical media industry isn’t what it used to be, though, and so Tsutaya decided to do a complete overhaul of the building, shutting it down for roughly a half-year in the process.

With the grand reopening of QFront, now renamed Shibuya Tsutaya, coming up soon, we’re getting a few advance looks at what the reborn building is going to have inside, and it appears that Starbucks has lost its spot. Instead of the Seattle-founded coffeehouse, the third floor of the building, with its amazing view of the world-famous Shibuya scramble intersection, is going to be taken up by Share Lounge, Tsutaya’s own cafe/lounge space.

Tsutaya opened its first Share Lounge in 2019 at Shibuya Scramble Square, a different entertainment complex in the neighborhood. Since then they’ve gone on to open a total of 25 in Japan, with the facilities a bit of a cross between a cafe and a co-working space.

For the new Shibuya Tsutaya branch, Share Lounge is looking to create two different atmospheres, one for the building’s third floor and one for the fourth. The third floor looks to be more leisure-oriented, with 93 seats and 46 standing spaces and displays of figures, including life-size versions, of characters from Japanese entertainment franchises produced by anime figure manufacturer Shibuya Scramble Figure (whose work we were wowed by at the recent Winter Wonder Festival).

▼ Some of Shibuya Scramble Figure’s creations

The fourth floor will be more business-oriented, including semi-private booths and meeting rooms, and with an assortment of free-to-read business publications and crowdfunding displays.

Instead of a traditional order system for food and drinks, Share Lounge operates on a timed “plan” system, with food, drinks, and light fare such as pasta, chicken, and French fries offered during customers’ stays. At the Shibuya Scramble Square branch, the standard plan is 1,650 yen (US$11.20) an hour, and the plan that includes alcoholic beverages is 2,200 yen an hour. Official pricing for the new Shibuya Tsutaya Share Lounge is yet to be announced, however.

Share Lounge opens on April 25, the same day as the Pokémon Card Lounge with loaner decks that’ll also be in the building.

Source: PR Times via IT Media, Tsutaya
Top image: PR Times
Insert images: PR Times, Shibuya Scramble Figure
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