astries, prepared breakfast and lunch sandwiches, oatmeal, and salads as well as sodas, juicesand bottled water. Additionally, Starbucks is a retailer of specialty coffee in the world. Starbucks alsosells coffee and tea products and licenses its trademark through other channels such as licensedretail stores. Starbucks operated 8,832 company operated stores and 7,803 licensed retail storesworldwide as of September 2009. Such an extensive product offering enabled the company toenhance its reach, cater to a wider customer base and meet their diverse needs efficiently.Research and development capabilities leveraged to strengthen product portfolioThe core strength behind Starbucks's brand is the quality of its products.The company has a strongresearch and development team which is responsible for the technical development of food andbeverage products and new equipment. Starbucks's strong research and development capabilitiesenable it to focus on relevant product innovation, expansion and leveraging of its existing productsand sales channels. For instance, in FY2009, the company launched Starbucks VIA ready brewcoffee to capture a significant share of both the $21 billion global instant coffee category and thesingle-serve market and further expanding its coffee expertise and leadership in local and internationalmarkets. Starbucks VIA is made with a proprietary, US patent-pending microgrind technology topreserve the coffee
’
s taste, quality and freshness. Additionally in September 2009, the company
’
sbrand Seattle
’
s best coffee introduced
“
Just Pure Flavor
”
, an innovation for fresh brewed coffee thatoffers customizable flavor by the cup.The new flavors use no dairy, sugar or artificial sweeteners,and add less than 50 calories to a 12 fl. oz. (5 calories) beverage.