By Rick Aristotle Munarriz (TMF Edible)

Let's make one thing perfectly clear. I tip my belled cap to the investors who got in early on Starbucks. When the company went public in 1992 -- with only 165 locations -- it was a great move for those who caught the early signs of percolation. Amazing visionary stuff. But, since Doc can't quite get the DeLorean to catapult us back in time, as investors we have to live in the here and now and ponder the there and later. Starbucks, with nearly 3000 sites about now, is looking at an entirely different frame of the horizon.

For starters, if the company were to expand at the same clip as the past eight years, it would have 48,000 units by the year 2008. Ha! And you thought there was a Starbucks on every corner already, right?

But, of course, the company is not even attempting to grow at that rate, and no one should expect the stock to mirror the past either. What happens is that -- and you see this time and time again, so I'm not suggesting something radically new -- as a company's growth rate slows, its P/E ratio contracts. Right now, Starbucks is fetching more than 60 times earnings, yet the growth rate going forward is just 25%. That's right, the company doesn't plan on cutting enough ribbon for 48,000 caffeinated bliss parlors.

Not in 2008. Not ever. Howard Schultz believes that a more realistic count is less than half that number of units further down the road. I'm a skeptic even then, but one thing is clear: The low-lying fruit in terms of choice real estate has already been plucked. What's next? Further saturation in key markets and entry into smaller secondary markets? Domestically, that's what we're down to.

Investors could have seen this coming. Even a quick glimpse at the company's own timeline finds the sign of an over-penetrated market. Entry into new states was proudly singled out in the annual milestones until 1998 -- when the company began celebrating new cities instead. In a few years, that timeline might very well include new blocks of suburbia and lemonade stand leveraged buyouts.

Overseas, we have a different situation. Last week the company entered its 17th international market. While Starbucks has had initial success in places like Japan and the United Kingdom, the gourmet coffee bar is clearly a cultural hurdle. It is more of a lifestyle suggestion than the radical convenience of a sixty-second burger. In these two tea-drinking countries, the novelty is good for the first few years, but what about elsewhere? What is Starbucks offering that is so radically new?

There's a reason why the best coffee beans are imported and why the place is serving brews with Italian monikers. Starbucks isn't the Americana original that can bull-rush the world at large like a McDonald's <% if gsSubBrand = "aolsnapshot" then Response.Write("(NYSE: MCD)") else Response.Write("(NYSE: MCD)") end if %> or a Coca-Cola <% if gsSubBrand = "aolsnapshot" then Response.Write("(NYSE: KO)") else Response.Write("(NYSE: KO)") end if %>. And, remember, we were all cheering when Japan embraced our Toys 'R' Us <% if gsSubBrand = "aolsnapshot" then Response.Write("(NYSE: TOY)") else Response.Write("(NYSE: TOY)") end if %> concept more than a decade ago. It gave a false sense of global validation.

But, let's whip out the Risk board and concede Japan in the near term. What about Kamchatka? You see, the same domestic principle is also at play in the global landscape. The early countries were lay-ups. Who can tell me that a $5 mocha chip cappuccino is going to be a brisk seller in Shanghai or Sydney this year?

Beyond that, there are a finite number of densely populated pockets that can support the typical Starbucks traffic. It's not just cannibalization and saturation, but the very fact that the world's population is scattered about in secondary markets in terms of any given radius. I'd hate to be the one to greenlight the 74th store in the Australian Outback. Unless Starbucks aims poorly the first time around, the next location will always be inferior to the previous one.

I'm not alone in seeing the limits to java world domination. The company sees it, too. That is why it has spent the past year dabbling in everything from a magazine concept that even Starbucks fans hate, to a tea company acquisition, to an Internet portal. Say it ain't so, Joe?

I think some of the moves into grocer shelf space are encouraging. I do. But the scattershot vision that comes with the implied notion that Starbucks can do no wrong is dangerous. Remember, part of the reason why Lou is probably so enamored with recent fiscal results is due to the fact that the stock got trounced at this time last year when it reported lower-than-expected earnings. I don't applaud the sandbagger.

I will applaud the Foolish community that was able to identify Starbucks early on. But, the fact that the stock burned investors the last time it was trading this high -- and the fact that the future will be a slow and uncertain rude awakening -- should have investors holding off on the decaf. They need to be alert to the possibility that, like a Starbucks after closing, the espresso was in the past. The mocha bears are coming, and you know what they are going to do.

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