Onward by Howard Schultz, Joanne Lesley Gordon

businesses like entertainment. And we were pushing products that deviated too far from the core coffee experience. As one Starbucks partner expressed, it was as if we were running a race but no longer knew what we were running for.
     
    During the Edgewater brainstorming session, as we sat in a circle and pondered our future, some of my colleagues said they recognized that Starbucks was at an inflection point or, as Jim put it, a “critical juncture.” I believed our predicament was much more serious. Starbuckswas on the verge of a defining test that we would fail if we did not look in the mirror, acknowledge our blemishes, and undertake transformative, even disruptive, change.
     

     
    By summer 2007, it was no longer enough for me to talk about my frustrations with our executives in Seattle. I had to go out on my own and speak to our store, district, and regional managers directly, as well as talk with baristas. I considered the fact that it might have bothered Jim that I was talking to other partners about what I perceived was wrong with Starbucks, but still I took it upon myself to have these direct conversations about the deteriorating store experience.
     
    For me, the most acute example of this, the most symbolic representation of how Starbucks was deviating from its heritage and losing its magic, was the breakfast sandwich.
     
    Starbucks first began serving sandwiches in 2003. Over the years we had experimented with many types, from bagel sandwiches to, in 2006, warm combinations of sausage, turkey bacon, and ham and egg on English muffins. We called the latter warm or breakfast sandwiches, and most of them included cheese. I understood why sandwiches made financial sense. For years customers had come into our stores with competitors’ food products, or only bought our coffee and then went elsewhere, or were buying lower-quality coffee where they purchased their breakfasts. The sandwiches met a need. As a result, they drove sales, drove profit, and drove comps.
     
    But I had resisted the idea of serving hot food from day one. While I encouraged innovation, I never envisioned people coming into Starbucks for a sandwich. Many customers, however, embraced the warm breakfast sandwich, grateful for a tasty, more substantial food offering. In fact, they gained quite a loyal following. The more popular they became, the more our baristas had to heat them in our warming ovens. And when they did, the sandwiches’ cheese would inevitably drip and then sizzle in the ovens, releasing a pungent smell. Whatever rich, hearty coffee aroma remained in the store was overwhelmed by singed Monterey Jack, mozzarella, and, most offensively, cheddar. The smell further chipped away at our narrative. Where was the magic in burnt cheese?
     
    People who have known me for years will tell you that few things had ever piqued my ire as much as
that smell
. As far as I was concerned, nothing could be further from the romance of the Italian espresso bar.
     
    I could not stand it.
     
    One day I walked into a Seattle Starbucks and immediately felt frustrated because burnt cheese had, once again, enveloped the store. I spoke to the manager about it. But she did not understand my concern because, she told me, the store had already far exceeded its sales goals for sandwiches for that week. I left the store depressed.
What would be next? Hash browns?
     
    The breakfast sandwich became my quintessential example of how we were losing our way. “Get the sandwiches out!” I pointedly told Michelle Gass, then our head of global products, even as we continued to introduce them into hundreds of new stores. An hour later, Jim told Michelle that Starbucks needed the sandwiches and would not take them out. Research and anecdotal evidence had told him that customers liked them, bringing into our stores more people who now included our sandwiches in their morning coffee rituals.
     
    Not surprisingly, Michelle and others felt uncomfortably pulled between two