Work Moving Fast on Full-Size Starbucks Coming to North Tuscaloosa’s Rice Mine Road

Work is moving right along on a new full-size Starbucks cafe in North Tuscaloosa on Rice Mine Road, the biggest of three new locations opening in the area this year.

As the Thread has previously reported, a Montgomery-based firm called RJ Development is in the process of bringing one Starbucks to 15th Street, where crews have demolished the old T-Town Tire shop as well as the city of Northport's first-ever Starbucks, planned for a vacant site on Lurleen B. Wallace Boulevard.

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The same developer and builder are also working on a third Starbucks and the largest of the bunch, a full-size cafe already framed up on Rice Mine Road between Taco Casa and Emanuel Baptist Church near New Watermelon Road.

The Rice Mine Road site once belonged to the church, but they subdivided about an acre of their land there and sold it for this development in a deal brokered by Robert Shaw of Hamner Real Estate. 

Brice Johnston, a partner at RJ Development, told the city council in 2023 that expansion in the Tuscaloosa market is one of Starbucks' highest priorities in the entire country. He spoke with the Thread this week about the trio of cafes he's got underway now, which are all being built by the same contractor, Snow-Blakeney Construction.

"The only difference with Rice Mine Road site from the others is that it will be a full-sized sit-down store," Johnston said. "The other two are drive-throughs with a walk-up outdoor patio."

Right now, things are pacing well for the developers to "turn over" their work to Starbucks sometime this summer for the coffee titan to put the finishing touches and decorations in place before opening for business.

Johnston said the Northport store on Highway 69 will almost certainly be finished last, but it's a tight race for whether the site on 15th Street or the Rice Mine Road project will be wrapped up first.

For more coverage of restaurant and retail development and other news from West Alabama, stay connected to the Tuscaloosa Thread.