Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built a Company One Cup at a Time

What a great read! This is a story of how Starbucks changed the world. Howard Schultz, the CEO, tells the history of Starbucks starting with its founding in 1971 up until 1999. Schultz tells how he came on board,later bought the company and its sky-roacketing growth. Schultz was working for a Swiss compnay that sold kitchen items. He noticed this small little speciality coffee store in Seattle was buying more plastic filters than anybody and he decided to see why. What started as curiousity quickly grew to a obsession that he had to leave his job as VP, move from NYC and start working for them. Schultz's business like sense and vision took the comapny to heights it had never imagined. A critical point is when he visited Italy and saw how community coffeeshops with their baristas and cappuchinos were exactly what Starbucks needed. The owners didn't think so and he left Starbucks to venture on his own. Later Starbucks was up for sell and he raised the capital to buy them out and merge his Italian coffeeshop idea with the speciality coffee store. What you find in this book is a great leadership wraped in a compelling tale. It reads like a novel but the lessons are like what is found in the best leadership or business books. Schultz explains why it is worth it to take risks, value the customers, value the employees and stick to the mission no matter what. Starbucks with its passionate leader changed the world. Before 1971, hardly no one drank strong coffee, heard of cappichinos or believed you could build a company giving benefits to part-time workers. no one but him believed Chicago or other parts of America would buy his what he was selling. Yes, he made money. But he started a revolution and changed the world. The book gets a little slower in the 2nd half when Schultz has to defend his critics and stay on top. But its compelling none the less. I highly recommend it with a good cup of Gold Coast - my favorite.

This is a FANTASTIC book about passion behind business, dealing with major growth, serving the customer, helping people from the heart, actually caring about the consumer, and caring about humanity at the same time. STARBUCKS and this book is a phenomenal role model for anyone in business, and for anyone who cares about more than just dollars. One of my favorite quotes as an example is: "Starbucks managers have the power to allocate donations to local causes like ballet and opera companies, AIDS organizations, food banks, schools, and PTAs. In every city, all eight-day old coffee beans are donated to food banks. Store managers also provide coffee for fund raisers...Since we don't exploit these actions for public relations, a lot of our customers don't even know about them." Here's to one incredible book, company, and the example that would help so many people if followed. They clearly are THE BEST for business, and for PEOPLE, and that's why their genuine from-the-heart care has paid off so well. This book is EXCEPTIONAL if you are looking for SUPERIOR a business model for success where everybody genuinely benefits. Deserves 10 Stars!

For starters, this is one very interesting and readable book, that's kind of hard to put down once started! It has an autobiographical narrative style, and has a refreshingly honest touch to it, which makes it all the more enjoyable. The actual tale itself is one of struggle & success, it's about one man and his team going through various trials and tribulations and achieving their dreams. And as this tale proceeds from chapter to chapter, the reader starts to draw his/her own learnings and makes mental notes of what to do and what not to do at their workplace. And therein lies the power of this book - it does not aim to preach or prescribe a method, but is an honest-to-god description of a great business leaders approach to how he addressed some of the issues he faced & achieved what he wanted to. The book itself seems to have gone through the same process of creation as a Starbucks store (as described in the book) & one can almost feel the passion and eye for detail as one leafs through its pages, quite truly the book reinforces many of the values that Starbucks itself stands for. In addition to being all the above, the book is a complete eye opener for anyone involved in the marketing of services to consumers. The hidden lessons in this book are many, and this book should appeal to wide ranging audience for its wonderful storyline. It's a good buy & looks wonderful on the shelf!

This is one of the best business biographies I have ever read. It is truly inspiring. One simple, and telling, output from reading this book on a plane was that as soon as we landed I headed to the local airport Starbucks for a latte. I rarely even drink coffee! So powerful are the imagery and the passion for coffee in his story that you can almost smell the roasted dark beans, feel them running through your fingers, hear the sounds of the espresso machine and taste the coffee itself!Why is this imagery so important? Because behind the corporate image of a relentless pac-man like machine churning out new locations at a rate slightly above the national birth rate it seems, is a simple vision of passion for coffee combined with Italian neighborhoods and a warm and friendly place where the worlds best coffee and social friendship intermix. That is what Starbucks was all about.The book itself is a remarkable insight into this journey. It was even more special for me, as I grew up with Starbucks - literally. When Howard talks about the vision he had to treat even his part time employees with full benefits and ownership in the company through stock, I know it was more than just a nice sounding corporate manta, it really worked. Friends I went to high school with in Bellevue in the mid to late 1980's worked at the first stores, and raved about this little coffee company and couldn't imagine working anywhere else. So, from firsthand experience I can tell you that what he says about the passion and vision coming to life in Seattle is all trueWhile company history is quite interesting, and the book itself just hums and glides without ever getting mundane, the real gems are in the emotional reality Howard displays. He talks about being overwhelmed to tears, about the rejection he faced while trying to get funding for his fledgling company, about the naysayers and others who nearly took it all away, and the struggle with having a hand in everything and slowly letting go. You know that you are reading about a real person, someone who came from a poor neighborhood in Brooklyn with working-class roots, not an image generated by a large corporations PR spin doctorsThe value of people, so often lost in corporate bureaucracy, is evident here. Starbucks grew because it struck an emotional chord with people. He knew that in order for the company to be successful he needed people who shared the values. This is often spoken of, and rarely practiced in the corporate world where systems, forecasts, processes and other such tools become the focal point, and the simple fact that all results come through people is lost. He speaks throughout the book of people who helped him, coached him, mentored him, challenged him, and made the company what it was. One quote in particular summarizes his views: "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." (Pa

Starbucks- the very name conjures up images of a brand not of coffee, but of passion , love, sincerity and superb customer service; that the coffee too is great (though expensive)is an added plus.. But here is a brand in the most common of products and having arrived to the top of the minds in less than a decade- how did it all happen? Pour Your Heart Into It is a fascinating saga of the Starbucks journey, written by the man -Howard Shultz- who made it happen! This is one of the best business biographies I have ever read for its storytelling of a person"s passion to his idea and then betting his life and much much more onto it.. While going through the book, I came across some very inspiring and meaningful quotes, either mentioned in the beginning of the chapter or as part of the narrative, here are some of them which have stayed with me even today months after I finished reading the book Highly recommended book for anybody who wants to live- and maybe die- by his or her BIG IDEA! Amazes me how in prime Mid Town Manhattan ;how a mere coffee store can have probably 8 shops in a 6 blocks radius - around 42nd and Madison but Starbucks is not coffee any more; I do not say now" Lets have coffee", we just say"Lets have a Starbucks"! POUR YOUR HEART HEART INTO IT:1. A HUNDRED TIMES EVERY DAY I REMIND MYSELF THAT MY INNER AND OUTER LIVES DEPENDED ON LABORS OF OTHER MEN,LIVING OR DEAD AND THAT I MUST EXERT MYSELF IN ORDER TO GIVE IN THE SAME MEASURE THAT I RECIEVED.....2.IF IT CAPTURES YOUR IMAGINATION..IT WILL PROBABLY CAPTIVATE OTHERS TOO.3.SOME MEN SEE THINGS AS THEY ARE AND SAY..WHY. I DREAM THINGS THAT NEVER WERE AND ASK..WHY NOT! 4.IF YOU SAY NEVER HAD A CHANCE,,PERHAPS YOU NEVER TOOK A CHANCE.5.VISION IS WHAT THEY CALL IT WHEN YOU CAN SEE WHAT OTHERS CAN NOT SEE6.WHENEVER YOU SEE A SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS...SOMEBODY SOMEDAY MUST HAVE MADE A COURAGEOUS DECISION...7.WE JUDGE OURSELVES BY WHAT WE FEEL CAPABLE OF DOING.. WHILE OTHERS JUDGE US BY WHAT WE HAVE ALREADY DONE...8.SOMETIMES..SINCERITY SELLS BETTER THAN BUSINESS PLANS9.THE ULTIMATE MEASURE OF A MAN IS NOT WHERE HE STANDS IN MOMENTS OF COMFORT AND CONVINIENCE ,BUT WHERE HE STAND AT TIMES OF CHALLENGE AND ADVERSITY...10.EVERYTHING MATTERS11.WHEN YOU SEE THE OPPORTUNITY OF A LIFETIME..MOVE QUICKLY12.A 100 STOREY BUILDING NEEDS A FIRM FOUNDATION13.DO NOT BE THREATENED Y MEN SMARTER THAN YOU14.THE BEST EXECUTIVE IS ONE WHO HAS GOOD SENSE TO PICK UP GOOD MEN TO DO WHAT HE WANTS DONE AND SELF RESTRAINT TO KEEP FROM MEDDLING WITH THEM WHILE THEY DO TI.15.THE ONLY SACRED COW IN AN ORGANISATION SHOULD BE IT"S BASIC PHILOSPHY OF DOING BUSINESS..16.TO STAY AHEAD,ALWAYS HAVE THE NEXT IDEA WAITING IN THE WINGS..17.THE BEST WAY TO BUILD A BRAND IS ONE PERSON AT A TIME.18.THE FUNDAMENTAL TASK IS TO ACHIEVE SMALLNESS WITHIN A LARGE ORGANISATION..19.VALUES SHOULD NOT WHITHER AS SALES GROW.