Back in the 1990s, when Starbucks was still seen by many as a grand folly hurtling toward failure, the parent of Restaurant Business scored a grande-sized coup. A sister publication, FoodService Director, hosted an annual conference at the time, where its readers, the foodservice directors of colleges, travel plazas and other captive operations, could shop for branded restaurant concepts to incorporate into their sites. Branding America would draw around 2,000 people, making it a must-attend event for anyone interested in the opportunities of nontraditional siting.
Among them were high-level executives of Starbucks, which was treated at the time with a blend of awe and derision. We leaned toward the former in asking if those representatives of the coffee giant could arrange an appearance at Branding America of their controversial, high-profile CEO, Howard Schultz. To our pleasant surprise, they made it happen.
I was active in the planning and presentation of Branding America, but was too preoccupied with things like coverage and moderating panels to muster much anticipation for a rare public appearance by Schultz. But the buzz as he took the stage was unmistakable. Would this be pulling back the curtain on the Wizard of Oz, or confirmation that a visionary was truly changing the business?
The audience expected to hear thunder and feel the ground quake as this luminary took the podium. Instead, here was a slight, quiet young man who had to speak up to be heard, and showed obvious signs of nervousness. He spoke not as a cocky Han Solo with the world to be conquered, but rather as a shy idealist with still-raw memories of his father breaking his leg on the route of his diaper-service delivery route. The family would slip into poverty and his dad would reel from the shame in the months afterward, leaving an indelible impression on the young Brooklynite. The emotional rawness made it seem like the events had unfolded just a week or two beforehand.
Schultz explained how that experience hardened his resolve to build a new sort of company where employees were just as important as the customers and owners. He laid out in detail the now-familiar Starbucks story, of how it was structured to be different.
He was still wrapping up when I dashed down to the gift shop of the host hotel, hoping to find Schultz’s autobiography in stock. No luck, much to my disappointment. I've been privileged to hear and cover speeches from hundreds of gifted orators and historical figures, including four ex-presidents. But nothing has affected me like Schultz's presentation.
Walking back to the ballroom where Schultz had spoken, I spied him heading through the hallway, his handlers hustling him along. “Nice job,” I called out from a few feet away.
He stopped dead and turned to me. “You think so? I mean, did you really think so?” he said, shaking his people for a moment for a reality check. The star of a high school musical couldn’t have been more nervous about the way his performance was perceived. “Do you think they liked it?”
I assured him that he’d been a hit, and told him how much he’d personally touched me, the son of a gardener whose toughened hands reflected a lifetime of planting and picking. “I hope so,” he said, shaking my hands and uttering a “Bye. Thank you!” as his handlers dragged him away.
If he’d ended our brief exchange with an “Aw, shucks,” I wouldn’t have been more surprised. This fearsome captain of industry was as grounded and humble as any executive I’d ever met, and that includes some legendary examples of individuals who’d gone from busboy to CEO.
I later had the privilege of essentially being on a speaking tour of sorts with Howard Behar, another of Starbucks’ founding fathers and a sometimes-critic of the other Howard. The two had fallen out over Schultz’s decision to close nearly 1,000 units and put all those associates out of work. Behar suggested there was a lot more ego to that other Howard than I saw that day 20 years ago, and that showboating became a routine thing from the corner office occupant.
Other Starbucks alumni I’ve met along the way have echoed that assessment. But, as colleague Heather Lalley and sparring partner Jonathan Maze noted yesterday, you can’t discount the lasting effect Schultz has had on the restaurant business. He not only changed the business model, proving that experience can command a super-premium price, but also demonstrated that an employee-centric approach is smart for purely financial reasons. The moral payback just elevates it to a different plane of satisfaction and success.
The speculation holds that Schultz will now run for the U.S. presidency, a possibility discounted by some of his acquaintances. They contend that Schultz is too thin-skinned to survive the constant ego bashing of a campaign run.
He wasn’t supposed to have the right stuff to build a Starbucks, either.
An iconoclast like Schultz—someone who truly deserves the tag of disruptor—could be the jolt to our political stagnation that we so desperately need.
Let’s hope he’s still a man of surprises.
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