Bangor’s newest Starbucks prepares for summer opening

A Starbucks will open at a newly built shopping center in Bangor in about a month, a co-owner of the development firm behind the project said Monday.

The city’s planning board in September 2022 approved Michigan-based Alrig USA’s proposal to build a shopping center on Broadway. Less than two years later, the center is almost finished but the interior is incomplete. The center holds space for three businesses, including the Starbucks, and there are eight Tesla charging stations for electric cars behind the center.

This will be the second standalone Starbucks in the city. The other location is at 38 Bangor Mall Blvd., and there is also a Starbucks kiosk inside Target on Longview Drive.

The coffeehouse chain’s sign went up in April at 699 Broadway, and workers with Massachusetts-based Russco General Contractors worked last week to complete renovations inside. The other two units are empty, and Bangor has not received an occupancy request for either of them, said David Warren, the city’s spokesperson.

An Alrig USA co-owner, who identified himself as Mike but declined to share his last name, said the building is filled. He declined to share details about the businesses that will occupy the center, saying that he did not want to “get ahead of my tenants.”

In September 2022, the commercial real estate and development firm had plans to build a 9,000-square-foot building that would house a drive-thru Starbucks, an Orange Theory gym and a medical clinic that’s part of a national chain, according to project plans and project engineer Jake Modestow. While the application listed tenants expected to occupy the center, plans still needed to be finalized, he said at the time.

The property, which spans two lots at 685 and 699 Broadway, is across the street from Walgreens. It used to be Kelley Car and Truck Center, an auto dealership that moved to Hammond Street in 2018.