More than anything else, technology will pave the way for innovative change at Starbucks. The bulk of Starbucks' innovation over the next several years will be technology-focused.
Interpretation
Technology is the driving force behind change and innovation at Starbucks.
In this quote, Howard Schultz emphasizes the critical role that technology will play in shaping the future of Starbucks. He suggests that the company's emphasis on technological advancements will lead to significant innovations that will transform its operations and customer experience in the coming years.
In practice
During a business presentation on the future of retail.
The rules of engagement around building a brand have changed significantly over the past 10 to 15 years. Where companies at one time could spread their message through traditional marketing, consumers now seek an enduring emotional connection with the companies they patronize. The foundation of that connection is the most important characteristic of building a world-class brand: trust. Trust with your people and trust with your customers.
The future of America is not an entitlement. We have been given a treasure chest of gifts and opportunities, but some people are being left behind, and success is not sustainable unless it is shared.
Starbucks is not an advertiser; people think we are a great marketing company, but in fact we spend very little money on marketing and more money on training our people than advertising.
While their service is ending, our responsibility is just beginning!
In life, you can blame a lot of people and you can wallow in self-pity or you can pick yourself up and say listen, I have to be responsible for myself.
When I first discovered in the early 1980s the Italian espresso bars in my trip to Italy, the vision was to re-create that for America - a third place that had not existed before. Starbucks re-created that in America in our own image; a place to go other than home or work. We also created an industry that did not exist: specialty coffee.
We are now spending half a trillion dollars on foreign oil, importing 62 percent of the oil we use, and we haven't had the leadership in D.C. to do anything about it. We've got to move to other sources of energy. But we've gotten way behind, and will continue to pay the fiddler. It's not a good future.
Today many people are switching to free software for purely practical reasons. That is good, as far as it goes, but that isn't all we need to do! Attracting users to free software is not the whole job, just the first step.
We live technologically, with man as the master of nature, man as the engineer, and let anyone who raises his voice against it stop using bridges not built by nature.... No electric light bulbs, no engines, no atomic energy, no calculating machines, no anaesthetics-back to the jungle.
The average TV commercial of sixty seconds has one hundred and twenty half-second clips in it, or one-third of a second. We bombard people with sensation. That substitutes for thinking.
Social media's greatest assets - anonymity, 'virality,' interconnectedness - are also its main weaknesses.
In a few years, men will be able to communicate more effectively through a machine than face to face. That is a rather startling thing to say, but it is our conclusion.
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