Coffee Bean In Downtown Manhattan Beach Closing Its Doors

MANHATTAN BEACH, CA — The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf store in downtown Manhattan Beach will shut its doors permanently at the end of today, according to a note on the front door. The reason for closing is not provided and questions sent to the corporate office have not been answered.

The store, just 2+ blocks from the Manhattan Beach Pier and beach, remained open during the COVID-19 pandemic, says the note, and asks customers to "Please take a minute to say thank you to each, and every one of these employees/crew members. ... These employees came to work each day to serve you and went above and beyond their usual jobs, with additional stress of taking on the unpleasant task of customer mask enforcement. Please convey your thanks and gratitude."

A recent corporate reply on Coffee Bean's Facebook page reads, "The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf We’ve made the difficult decision to close a number of our company-owned store locations in California and Arizona in order to provide the best possible experience for our Guests. We hope that you can visit one of our other locations, or find your favorite coffees and teas online at store.coffeebean.com. We appreciate your feedback and continued support."

The downtown MB location is at 321 Manhattan Beach Boulevard, just a few doors down from the Trina Turk signature boutique that closed yesterday. It is open until today. The phone number is (310) 545-2827. The official Coffee Bean website says the store is open until 6 p.m.

The California-based Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf chain, with some 1,200 stores in more than 25 countries, was sold to Jollibee, the Philippines' largest fast food chain, in July of 2019. At the time, Jollibee said it would focus on growing the Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf brand in Asia.