Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built A Company One Cup At A Time (1999) - Plot & Excerpts
"If people relate to the company they work for, if they form an emotional tie to it and buy into its dreams, they will pour their heart into making it better.""Nike is the only other company I know of that did something comparable. Sneakers were certainly a commodity—cheap and standard and practical and generally not very good. Nike’s strategy was first to design world-class running shoes and then to create an atmosphere of top-flight athletic performance and witty irreverence around them. That spirit caught on so widely that it inspired myriads of nonathletes to lace up Nike shoes as well. Back in the 1970s, good sneakers cost $20 a pair. Who would have thought anyone would pay $140 for a pair of basketball shoes?""If you want to build a great enterprise, you have to have the courage to dream great dreams. If you dream small dreams, you may succeed in building something small. For many people, that is enough. But if you want to achieve widespread impact and lasting value, be bold.""For me, the thrill of business is in the climb. Everything we try to achieve is like climbing a steep slope, one that very few people have managed to scale. The more difficult the climb, the more gratifying the effort put into the ascent and the greater the satisfaction upon reaching the summit. But, like all dedicated mountain climbers, we’re always seeking a higher peak.""Big opportunities lie in the creation of something new. But that innovation has to be relevant and inspiring, or it will burst into color and fade away as quickly as fireworks.""That’s the kind of mentor I never had as a kid or as a young adult. If one doesn’t find you, beat the bushes till you find one who will take you on. And with the right mentor, don’t be afraid to expose your vulnerabilities. Admit you don’t know what you don’t know. When you acknowledge your weaknesses and ask for advice, you’ll be surprised how much others will help.""In this ever-changing society, the most powerful and enduring brands are built from the heart. They are real and sustainable. Their foundations are stronger because they are built with the strength of the human spirit, not an ad campaign. The companies that are lasting are those that are authentic.Take Nike as an example. Few people remember that Phil Knight disdained advertising for years, preferring event promotions and athlete endorsements. He built Nike’s reputation on the basis of authenticity, focusing on how its shoes improved athletic performance. Long after running shoes became a fashion statement and street wear, Nike continued to highlight technical superiority. Long after Nike became known for its megamillion-dollar award-winning TV ad campaigns, the company still embraced its legacy as the shoe of choice of the best athletes.""Whatever you do, don’t play it safe. Don’t do things the way they’ve always been done. Don’t try to fit the system. If you do what’s expected of you, you’ll never accomplish more than others expect.""By emphasizing a strong commitment to reinvention and self-renewal, by keeping the entrepreneurial spirit alive, we’re doing all we can to foster an atmosphere that encourages innovation.""Victory is much more meaningful when it comes not just from the efforts of one person, but from the joint achievements of many. The euphoria is lasting when all participants lead with their hearts, winning not just for themselves but for one another.Success is sweetest when it’s shared."Rating: 4/5
It started out to be enjoying, but the excitment dwindles over time. Howard Schultz is unequavocally a successful businessman, one that has diligently fought his way as an underdog to become a CEO of a billion dollar's company, having built a long-lasting and sustainable corporation that is not only financially blosomming but also, according to him, preserves its legacy, which I dont think that was the case. He made several decisions that had proved to be , several of which are to offer Frappuchino (it catered to the taste of whoever needs cafein flowing in their veins to stay alert like me, not to enjoy the tantilizing aroma of Italian coffee), to sell coffee in supermarkets, financial-oriented, rather than to be made by Italian coffee purists.In the book he has glorified every decision of his despite its apllicability. That it worked once, when few people knew of what is good coffee, does not necessarily mean it would succeeed later. He cared pettily too much of how the Wallstreet pundits would respond to every decision or any given circumstance in regards to financial and justified every move the corporation made as a way to enhance the company's public (readers) relation. Yet his approach is somewhat justified by practicality of the action.However, his determination, his conscience to preserving the legacy and not selling soul, though somewhat compromised in several incidents, his ideology of centering the PEOPLE and investing in them, of unrelentingly looking for "right" partners that shared his own ideology, enthused me. I will give you guys an example of his personality in comparison to Steve Job's to prove my point.When the president of the US invited him for to the Oval office along with other CEOs, his reaction is calling his mom saying Hey mom I am talking to the president.Steve reacted by refusing the invitation, saying "I am not going to get slotted in for a token meeting so that he can check off that he met with a CEO" and demanded Obama to talk to him directly if he genuinely wants to discuss things with Job.In overall, it is a good read, but not a great one.
What do You think about Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built A Company One Cup At A Time (1999)?
Supposed to be inspirational for starting a business, but actually rather the opposite. This guy is so ambitious, so confident, so determined, so certain, so driven. I'm feeling much the opposite these days. If that stuff is what it takes, I have no business starting a business....I really enjoyed the beginning of this book, which was kind of a corporate adventure story about starting Starbucks from about three local stores and a mail-order catalog. It was exhilarating reading about all the challenges they faced in their ridiculously ambitious early years of kudzu-style growth. But by the last hundred pages or so, Starbucks is already ridiculously huge, so all there is to talk about is variations on the theme. We've got the coffee shop thing down, so we're branching into ice cream, partnering with United to do coffee on planes, installing tiny Starbucks in bookstores, blah blah blah. Worse, once they become a monolith, everybody stops rooting for them as the underdog and starts treating them like any other giant corporation. Despite all the good they try to do and how hard it is to stick to their principles, people misunderstand, falsely accuse, and criticize Starbucks. Well, I understand--it does suck when people do that to you--but after awhile it's difficult to sympathize with poor widdle Starbucks, all rich and huge and successful beyond most people's wildest dreams. Boo hoo, they're being treated like a huge and powerful corporation, when they're actually... a huge and powerful corporation. Lots of defensiveness and whining here. The book is getting so tedious, the only thing that's keeping me from tossing it aside is how close I am to the end. I like to finish things....Finally done. Maybe I'm being unfair in assigning only two stars--I really enjoyed the first 2/3 or so of this book, but the last 100 pages were so tedious, whiny, and self-congratulatory, they dragged the average way down.
—Cara
Good story about how starbucks came to be and the hurdles the founder had to overcome to make starbucks what it is today.This is potentially a reread later but from what I can remember it was not a Hell Yes I must re-read this. Personal notes:-He had 217 now out of 247 when raising money which was ridiculously humbling and remind me that every dream takes intense work, drive, and desire. -Investors invest in people not ideas and the simple notion that when you stand by people, they will stand by you. -There are so many ways to impact the world that I possibly can't do it all so i need to focus on the one area I want to change and put all my energy into it. -Howard also worked at Xerox and made 50 cold calls a day and developed thick skin. So stop being a wimp.
—Pascal Wagner
It's hard to imagine the small, entrepreneurial version of Starbucks, all those years ago. Howard Schulz's claims of putting the people first, working in a team, sharing is caring... it's all very admirable and maybe even true but it comes across as a lot of platitudes, more for show than being truly meaningful. Nonetheless it's an interesting look back at the origins of this huge company and a reminder, to paraphrase Steve Jobs, that it's easy to connect the dots when you look back but success, in this form at least, was by no means a given from the start.I listened to the audio book and again, as with many books unfortunately, Howard Schulz doesn't do his own narration.
—Anna Lundberg
