Stock Chart for Starbucks Corp (SBUX) 
 
 Coming soon to a Starbucks near you: Greek yogurt. 
 
 In a partnership with Danone SA (BN), the world’s largest coffee shop operator will start selling the dairy product in its cafes next year and in food retailers in 2015. The plan helps address two of Chief Executive Officer Howard Schultz’s key concerns: offering healthier fare and helping Starbucks Corp. colonize the grocery store. 
 
 “Starbucks is venturing into becoming a house of brands,” similar to Procter & Gamble Co. (PG) and Unilever, Bill Chidley, senior vice president at Interbrand Design Forum in Dayton, Ohio, said in an interview. The move is risky, he said. 
 
 “When you start to get too diverse with your portfolio, investors just have a hard time characterizing what you are,” Chidley said. “Are they a house of brands or are they about beverage experiences?” 
 
 Starbucks has steadily been moving into the grocery business since 1995, when it began selling ice cream in such flavors as java chip frappuccino and caramel macchiato. It has since added packaged coffee, Tazo brand tea and Via instant packets. Since wresting control of Starbucks (SBUX)’ supermarket business from Kraft Foods Inc. in 2011, Schultz has accelerated his rollout of new items into grocery stores with Keurig K-Cup pods, Evolution Fresh juice and Refreshers energy drinks. 
 
 Danone, the Paris-based maker of Oikos and Activia brand yogurts, will make the new products for Starbucks, which will be branded “Evolution Fresh, Inspired by Dannon.” The financial terms of the partnership weren’t disclosed. Starbucks bought juicemaker Evolution Fresh in 2011 for $30 million in cash before snapping up Teavana Holdings Inc., whose products it also plans to sell in grocery stores. 
 
 Grocery Expansion 
 
 Starbucks’s grocery business has been expanding faster than its cafe sales. In the year ended in September, revenue from selling items in supermarkets and other retailers jumped 50 percent to $1.29 billion, according to a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. Total revenue that same year increased 14 percent to $13.3 billion. 
 
 The shares fell 1.2 percent to $68.19 at 12:02 p.m. in New York. They had gained 29 percent this year through yesterday, compared with a 19 percent increase for the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index. 
 
 Starbucks will start selling Greek yogurt parfaits in its company-owned U.S. stores next year. The coffee-shop operator is considering selling the yogurt internationally and may create other foods with Danone, said Jim Olson, a Starbucks spokesman. 
 
 Big Step 
 
 “This is really the next big strategic step in our health and wellness evolution,” he said. 
 
 Sales of yogurt are increasing -- even more so for the Greek variety. Greek-style yogurt sales in the U.S. surged 48 percent to $2.65 billion in the 52 weeks ended June 8, according to data from Nielsen. Sales of all yogurt increased 6.1 percent to $6.3 billion during the same time, the data show. 
 
 Chobani Inc., General Mills Inc. (GIS)’s Yoplait and Fage Dairy Industry SA also sell Greek yogurt. 
 
 “It’s certainly crowded,” Interbrand’s Chidley said. “A new entrant is going to have to have something compelling.” 
 
 To contact the reporter on this story: Leslie Patton in Chicago at lpatton5@bloomberg.net 
 
 To contact the editor responsible for this story: Robin Ajello at rajello@bloomberg.net ||||| Starbucks Corp. is making another move to get on more grocery shelves, this time partnering with Danone SA to sell Greek yogurt parfaits and other similar items. 
 
 The yogurt products will be co-branded as "Evolution Fresh, Inspired by Dannon," referring to the European company's U.S. line of Dannon yogurt and Starbucks's juice line, Evolution Fresh. The items will first be sold in Starbucks cafes next spring, then in supermarkets in 2015, the companies said Tuesday. Sales overseas are a possibility, eventually. 
 
 Starbucks says the yogurt segment in the U.S. is a $6 billion business, with room to grow significantly. U.S. consumers on average eat about half as much yogurt as Canadians consume annually, and a third as much as Europeans, according to Euromonitor. "With a fast-growing but still low penetration of the yogurt category, the U.S. remains a key growth opportunity for Danone," Danone Chief Executive Franck Riboud said in a statement. 
 
 Competition will be tough. Chobani Inc.—the leading maker of Greek yogurt, with sales that topped $1 billion last year—recently came out with 14 new items, including flavors like coconut, key lime and orange vanilla. Chobani's founder, Hamdi Ulukaya, has said annual sales of yogurt could double over the next three to four years. The hope is that Americans will start eating yogurt more often during the day—as a dip with a meal, or as a dessert after dinner—rather than just at breakfast. 
 
 Starbucks has been working to diversify its traditional coffee business by expanding into more packaged products and food. It acquired Evolution Fresh in November 2011 for $30 million. It also recently purchased a loose-leaf tea retailer, Teavana, for $620 million, and has taken on other new ventures, including a line of energy drinks, a San Francisco Bay-area bakery, and its own single-serve coffee espresso brewer. 
 
 In addition to helping Starbucks get a piece of the action in the fast-growing yogurt market, the parfait plan could help build awareness of Evolution Fresh. 
 
 Danone's Oikos brand Greek yogurt topped the list of best-selling food products launched in the U.S. last year, according to an annual poll by IRI published in April. Danone says its growth will be accelerated by having access to millions of consumers through Starbucks's cafes. 
 
 Starbucks didn't disclose the financial terms of the deal, but said Danone will handle the distribution, so it doesn't expect to face additional capital expenses. The coffee giant is scheduled to report its quarterly earnings Thursday. 
 
 Corrections & Amplifications 
 
 Starbucks bought Evolution Fresh in November 2011. An earlier version of this article incorrectly said the acquisition was last November. ||||| Pedestrian Jodi Grey walks in front of the Starbucks-owned Evolution Fresh juice bar on its opening day in Bellevue, Washington March 19, 2012. 
 
 Arthur Rubinfeld, Starbucks president of global development, arranges the display of Evolution Fresh food products on display for sale at the opening of the Starbucks-owned juice bar in Bellevue, Washington March 19, 2012. 
 
 A customer walks past the Starbucks-owned Evolution Fresh juice bar on its opening day in Bellevue, Washington March 19, 2012. 
 
 The logo of Starbucks-owned Evolution Fresh juice bar is seen on its opening day in Bellevue, Washington March 19, 2012. 
 
 LOS ANGELES Starbucks Corp opened the first store in its new Evolution Fresh juice bar chain on Monday, its biggest move outside coffee aimed at boosting the company's position in the $50 billion health food sector. 
 
 The juice bar business is, however, fragmented and intensely competitive and some analysts say the Evolution Fresh shops could have lower margins than Starbucks' coffee shops. 
 
 With Starbucks yet to detail how many juice bars it plans to open, the popularity of its first shop, located in an upscale shopping area in Bellevue, Washington, an affluent city just east of Seattle, will be closely watched. 
 
 "Mixologists" at the new shop dispense a variety of juices - including apple, coconut water, carrot and beet - from taps to create "hand crafted" concoctions with names like "sweet burn" and "field of greens". The 8-ounce drinks sell for $4.99 and the 16-ounce drinks are priced at $7.99. 
 
 The juice bar also sells bottled Evolution Fresh fruit and vegetable juices, smoothies and food, such as oatmeal, wraps, salads and soups. The menu includes vegan and vegetarian options and so-called super foods like kale and quinoa are well represented. 
 
 Fresh fruit and vegetable juices have gained in popularity in the United States with some health-conscious consumers using them as meal replacements, while others drink them as part of "cleansing" diets. 
 
 The world's biggest coffee chain bought Evolution Fresh for $30 million in cash in November to get a piece of that business. At the time of the purchase, Starbucks Chief Executive Howard Schultz said successful independent juice bars have annual sales of well over $1 million per unit. 
 
 Analysts have said that is a bit less than an average U.S. Starbucks cafe but more than a typical store for rival Jamba Inc, a publicly held juice and smoothie chain that recently introduced new squeezed-to-order juice blends. That move from Jamba came months after Starbucks and McDonald's Corp introduced their own smoothies. 
 
 "Starbucks is one of the savviest companies in terms of what they do, of probably any company," said John Sicher, editor and publisher of Beverage Digest. 
 
 While Starbucks ranks among the nation's best companies at marketing and Americans are willing to spend money on healthy beverages, he declined to predict whether consumers would embrace the concept. 
 
 Bernstein analyst Sara Senatore noted that some of Starbucks' recent roll-outs - particularly its Via instant coffee and K-cups coffee refills for Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Inc's popular Keurig one-cup brewers - have far exceeded analysts' expectations. 
 
 "The lesson from those is not to underestimate Starbucks' ability to execute a concept very, very well," Senatore said. 
 
 The Evolution Fresh store opening comes just ahead of Starbucks' annual shareholder meeting on Wednesday. 
 
 Investors in Seattle-based Starbucks have seen shares in the company soar since it restructured by slashing costs and closing nearly 1,000 stores around the world. The stock, which was trading at just under $10 in February 2009, was trading above $53 on Monday. 
 
 Starbucks' purchase of Evolution Fresh was in line with its strategy to sell a broader range of products through its own cafes, grocery stores and other retail outlets. 
 
 Since purchasing the company, Starbucks has expanded distribution of its bottled juices beyond a handful of retailers that included Whole Foods Market Inc to more grocery sellers. 
 
 Evolution Fresh bottled juices will be sold in Starbucks' company-owned stores this year, replacing Naked Juice products from PepsiCo Inc. 
 
 Pepsi and Coca-Cola Co, owner of Odwalla, are big players in the $5 billion packaged juice category where Evolution Fresh competes. 
 
 San Bernardino, California-based Evolution Fresh was started by the founder of Naked Juice. It uses a heat-free, high-pressure pasteurization process. The company says that process retains more of the nutrients in the juice, compared with the conventional heat pasteurization used by some rivals in the refrigerated juice category. 
 
 Many independent juice bars do not pasteurize their made-to-order juices. 
 
 (Additional reporting by Martinne Geller in New York and Anthony Bolante in Seattle; Editing by Edwina Gibbs and Richard Chang)
– If the booming sales weren't enough to convince you that Greek yogurt is a thing, try this: Starbucks wants in. The company plans to start selling the yogurt in its stores next spring, and then start stocking supermarket shelves around the country after that, reports the Wall Street Journal. It will be sold as as "Evolution Fresh, Inspired by Dannon," a reflection that Starbucks is teaming with Dannon parent company Danone. Evolution Fresh is the name of the Starbucks juice line already being sold. Why Greek yogurt? It probably has something to do with the fact that US sales jumped 48% to $2.65 billion in the year ending June 8, reports Bloomberg. But one analyst thinks the Starbucks move toward becoming a "house of brands" is a risky one. “When you start to get too diverse with your portfolio, investors just have a hard time characterizing what you are,” he says. “Are they a house of brands or are they about beverage experiences?” (Maybe Starbucks can help figure out what to do with the nasty byproduct that results from the making of Greek yogurt.)