Caribou Coffee Shops in Royal Oak to be Converted to Peet's Coffee & Tea

The Caribou Coffee shops in Royal Oak will remain open and convert to Peet's Coffee & Tea, according a store employee.

Kayla Ray, who works at the Caribou Coffee at 31901 Woodward Ave., said Royal Oak's locations (the other is at 401 S. Main St.) are two of eight shops that will remain open in Michigan. The others will close, Ray said. Michigan has 22 Caribou Coffee locations.

The closures are part of a larger movement for the company – 80 of the nation's struggling stores will close and 88 others will be converted to Peet's Coffee & Tea locations, according to company representatives. 

That conversion will take anywhere from a year to 18 months, a Caribou spokeswoman said Monday. Meanwhile, the stores will remain open as a Caribou, employees said.

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.

Andy Ambrosius and Carrie Frillman contributed to this article.