The Unfortunate Reason Starbucks No Longer Sells Bananas

A coffee with a chocolate croissant or blueberry muffin is ideal, but sometimes starting the day off on a lighter note is desired. If you want something sweet but healthy to pair with your Starbucks iced coffee, snagging a banana placed by the cashier is always an option. Correction: It was (past tense) always an option. You might not have noticed, but bananas have been pulled from all U.S. Starbucks stores. 

It's been years since bananas were offered in Starbucks stores, or listed on the online menu. Previously, in addition to grabbing a fresh banana to eat, bananas could also be added to a Frappuccino drink. So what happened? Starbucks shared in a statement with Food Republic, "We removed fresh and frozen bananas from the menu in May 2022. As a standard course of business, we continually evaluate the items on our menu, using various criteria to ensure we are meeting the needs of our customers and our business priorities."

It's safe to assume that a simple banana may not have been a best-seller at the coffee chain; The individual fruit sold for $1.50, while in a grocer like Trader Joe's, a single banana can be purchased for 23 cents. As restaurants and chains make an effort to simplify menus to reduce inventory management and focus on selling more high-profit items, it's logical that bananas didn't make the cut. 

This change appears to stem from several factors, with banana waste being a primary reason. On the r/Starbucks thread, an employee reported that ordering 24 bananas, selling 1 or 2, and then tossing the rest was standard for their store. The banana waste was so bad in some stores, that employees on Reddit reported taking home overripe bananas to bake banana bread. (Overripe bananas are better for banana bread, but apparently worse for business.) It would have been a nice touch to see the bananas used to make Starbucks' banana walnut loaf, but the baked goods are sourced externally, and delivered to Starbucks packaged and frozen.

Starbucks locations in Japan seemed to have figured out this food waste dilemma: In mid 2024, outposts across the country launched a seasonal Banana Brûlée Frappuccino, Banana Rice Flour Roll Cake, and a Banana Rice Flour Muffin. Each of these products used bananas that would have otherwise gone to waste, saving an estimated three million bananas.

Another problem with stocking bananas: fruit flies. Bananas are a notorious source of these pests, which lay their eggs on the peels. Employees reported on Reddit that fruit flies would gather around the cashier area when bananas were stocked, which, of course, was not a pleasant environment for customers. One solution for this is washing them right after purchasing, but it seems this wasn't a practice at Starbucks.

It's challenging to keep fresh fruit stocked and make sure it doesn't go bad too quickly — especially bananas. As Starbucks employees have reported, the bananas could be green one day, and then on the verge of turning brown the next day. In fact, a study from Sweden's Karlstad University showed that bananas are one of the most wasted foods, so cutting bananas from inventory in United States locations was probably a good step toward sustainability for the chain.

Looking at Starbucks' online menu in the United States, no individual fresh fruit is listed. Starbucks stocks juices, fruit pouches, and snack boxes with apple slices, but hasn't confirmed whether bananas, or any other type of fresh fruit, will ever be back in the future. As for Starbucks locations outside of the U.S., fresh fruit can still be found on some menus. In the Middle East, some locations offer fresh fruit salads that feature a medley of chopped apples, kiwi, mango, strawberries, and watermelon. The Starbucks online menu for the U.K. does list bananas as an option, so it's possible those locations have figured out a solution to prevent this food waste issue.

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