Howard Schultz
Chairman Emeritus, Starbucks. On 2 shows, 2 appearances. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
executivefounderinvestorauthor@HowardSchultz ↗schultzfamilyfoundation.org ↗
Howard Schultz acquired Starbucks in 1987 and served multiple stints as its chief executive officer, expanding the business into a global coffeehouse chain. He also co-founded the venture capital firm Maveron and has authored several business books.
2shows
2appearances
71statements
31resolved
18supported
1contradicted
58%fully supported
77said about them ↓ Everything Howard Schultz said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Schultz: Coffee in Italy is no longer as good as it once was
“The by and large coffee in Italy is not as good as it once was. There are certain coffee companies that have maintained the standard, but by and large, the coffee is not as good.”
Schultz: An Il Giornale investor tried to hijack the 1987 Starbucks acquisition
“Jerry gave me about, I think he gave me 90 days to raise 3.8 million dollars. Around the second month, he just came to me and said, where are you with all this? And I think I had about half of it raised. I might have fibbed a bit and said I had a little bit mo…”
Schultz: Mobile Order & Pay is Starbucks' biggest Achilles' heel
“It is the biggest Achilles heel for Starbucks. And it's not even a close second.”
Schultz: Starbucks developed hubris and shifted to playing defense over time
“The worst thing that could happen to a company is believing that you are incapable of doing anything but succeeding, and you deserve the success. But if you start playing defense and don't have the offensive mind, it's not going to go well. And I think over ti…”
Schultz: No desire or intent to return as Starbucks CEO
“The first thing I want to say is I've made it clear to the Starbucks board, Howard Schultz, and I've made it clear to Loxman, Howard Schultz has no desire or intent to return as CEO of Starbucks.”
Schultz: Starbucks introduced the caffè latte to America without trademarking it
“The other thing I didn't do is we introduced cafe latte to the, to America. We didn't trademark it. You know, we trademarked Frappuccino later on, but we didn't trademark cafe latte.”
Schultz: Starbucks Pricing Has Become a Problem Amid Recent Inflation
“There certainly was a fair amount of discussion all the time about the sensitivity of the price points, and I think in later years, maybe in the last couple years, given the consumer inflationary time, I think it's become a bit of a problem.”
Schultz: Starbucks was seven months from insolvency in 2008
“I went up there, and I laid it out. Chapter and verse. I think we have seven months left. We are going to be insolvent.”
Schultz: Previous Starbucks leadership diluted coffee quality to maximize yield
“Because the previous administration had done things that diluted the integrity of coffee to maximize yield.”
Schultz: Starbucks Asia delivers higher brand experience than US stores
“The interesting thing to me today is that the Asian business is operating at a much higher level
Of the soft side of Starbucks than we are in the U S”
Schultz: Starbucks Replaced Entire Executive Team Except General Counsel
“He was right, except for one, the general counsel. They were all gone.”
Schultz: Starbucks should not have launched 24/7 on-demand mobile ordering
“I don't think I would have allowed the mobile app to be on demand, 24 hours a day. I would have slow rolled the availability of it, and then understood how it was being used, and whether or not it was going to disrupt the experience.”
Schultz: Starbucks would not have succeeded under a franchise model
“I never believed that we could build, maintain, and elevate the culture of the company, which I viewed as the thing in a franchise system, where we had individual franchisees who had their own subculture. And so even though there was pressure early on because …”
Schultz: Starbucks underestimated the public groundswell for unionization after COVID missteps
“And I think the company made some early mistakes. Some of which were COVID related. Again, no textbook had to deal with COVID issues, health issues, safety issues. And then I think underestimated the groundswell of public sentiment for this movement in America…”
Schultz: Straight espresso is Starbucks' number one selling beverage in Italy
“Two, three years later, what do you think the number one beverage is? It's espresso. For Starbucks. Straight espresso. Espresso is the number one beverage.”
Schultz: Post-founder companies lose entrepreneurial DNA and play defense out of fear
“Founder leaves, I'm not talking about me, it's you, historically, and companies lose not only the extent of the entrepreneurial DNA, but they lose the ability to be on offense. And the worst thing that a company can do, like a sports team, is start playing def…”
Schultz: Starbucks had about seven months until insolvency in 2008
“I knew that we had about seven months left, if we continued on this track, where we would be insolvable.”
Schultz: Faema and Lavazza both rejected investing in Il Giornale
“One is the espresso company, Faima. And one is the large Italian coffee company Lavazza. And I asked them both to invest in my idea. And both of them turned me down.”
Schultz: Selling in Costco Directly Increased Starbucks Retail Store Sales
“In fact, putting Starbucks in Costco, we were able to measure directly
The increase in volume in the stores on the east side as a result of the proximity to the Costco store.”
Schultz: Coca-Cola dismissed Starbucks ready-to-drink pitch in under 30 minutes
“The Coke meeting was a meeting lasted less than 30 minutes. I can't remember who I met with. They dismissed me didn't view Starbucks or, didn't understand what I was trying to do and didn't give me much time to even explain it.”
Schultz: Starbucks suspended buybacks to invest over $2B into partners
“The day I came back, and I knew what the market would do, is I announced that we were suspending the stock buybacks, and stock went down. I expected it, and I announced that we were going to take basically the money we were using to stock buybacks for the year…”
Schultz: Bill Gates Sr. forced rival bidder to withdraw Starbucks offer
“And all I remember him saying is, you should be ashamed of yourself. That you're gonna steal this kid's dream. It's not gonna happen. You and I both know this is not gonna happen. And within 10 minutes, he told them to stand down, we're walking out of this off…”
Schultz: Needing consultants means a company does not know its business
“If we have to hire a consultant, it means that we don't really know our business.”
Schultz: Legacy Coffee Giants Were Too Arrogant to See Retail Coffee Opportunity
“I think the large companies just never believed that you could build a national company and brand around selling coffee in the cup. I don't, I just think they were naive, maybe arrogant, and they gave us a lot of runway.”
The other half of the tape: Howard Schultz's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 70 times in 32 episodes across the shows. 7 statements on the record name them. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Guy Raz 41Scott Svenson 7Sarah Kauss 7Vicky Tsai 6Daniel Ek 3Ben Gilbert 2Maxine Clark 1Jamie Dimon 1
Statements about Howard Schultz, by other people (7)
Clark: Great merchants aggregate and sell existing products rather than invent them
“I didn't create any of this, I didn't invent any of these parts. The I just brought the parts together, which is what a great merchant does. Like Jeff Bezos didn't write the books. He just put the books together on a platform that you could, we all could buy a…”
Schultz was rejected by 217 of 242 investors for initial $1.6M round
“For the initial 1.6 million that you raised for Il Giornale, you talked to 242 investors, 217 of which said no.”
Errett: Howard Schultz urged Maveron to slow investments in fall 2007
“I will never forget it was the fall of 2007, and we had an investment meeting in Seattle, and he walked in and he said, we need to slow down our investments.”
Gilbert: Approximately 70% of Starbucks drink sales are now iced beverages
“What is it, 70% of drinks are now iced beverages, and it was when you started, zero percent.”
Ek: Starbucks was one of the largest CD retailers in the US
“Starbucks and Howard Schultz was actually one of the biggest retailers of CDs. In the U.S.”
Tsai Presented China Frappuccino Launch to Starbucks Board for Howard Schultz
“Howard was super happy with it and had me present to his board of directors”
Howard Schultz Offered Tsai Any Job at Starbucks to Prevent Her Departure
“Howard Schultz found out, and he called me on my mobile phone and asked me to come in and meet with him. So I went back to his office, and it was the week that my furniture was, you know, already on a truck to San Francisco. And he kept on being like, why? Why…”
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
How I Built This 63
Acquired 7
2026 3 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2025 12 mentions in 5 episodes 2 per episode
2024 4 mentions in 3 episodes 1 per episode
2023 11 mentions in 3 episodes 4 per episode
2021 8 mentions in 5 episodes 2 per episode
2020 24 mentions in 9 episodes 3 per episode
- S'well: Sarah Kauss
- Tatcha: Vicky Tsai
- Panera Bread/Au Bon Pain: Ron Shaich (2018)
- How I Built Resilience: Live with Sadie Lincoln
- Kenneth Cole: Kenneth Cole
- How I Built Resilience (Special Edition): Guy Raz
- How I Built Resilience: Live with Tony Xu and Marcia Kilgore
- Sweetgreen: Nicolas Jammet and Jonathan Neman
- 1 more episode that year, every mention in 2020 →
2019 1 mention in 1 episode
2018 4 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
2017 3 mentions in 2 episodes 2 per episode
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Howard's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ACQUIREDLEDGER | Chairman Emeritus, Starbucks | 1 | 53 | 59% 13/22 | full record on Acquired → |
| HOW I BUILT THISLEDGER | Chairman Emeritus, Starbucks | 1 | 18 | 56% 5/9 | full record on How I Built This → |