Starbucks' Bitter Brew | The Founder's Curse | 1

Business Wars

Wondery

History, Business, David Brown, Management

4.6 • 13.2K Ratings

🗓️ 7 May 2025

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

It's 2021 and Starbucks workers are experiencing post-pandemic exhaustion. For the first time, baristas and others seem poised to vote to form a union. To head that off, Starbucks legendary CEO, Howard Schultz, comes out of retirement. He promises to lead Starbucks back to its employee-friendly, community coffeehouse roots. But workers aren’t buying it. Soon, Schultz will be called to the carpet in Congress. The nation’s top coffee chain is in an existential crisis.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Wonderly Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of Business Wars Starbucks Bitter Brew early and ad-free right now.
0:08.0	Join Wonderly Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
0:13.6	That was a really good slurp.
0:24.1	Let's see if we can go a little louder.
0:25.7	Let's try it again.
0:29.1	It's November 2021 in Buffalo, New York, and Starbucks is having labor pains.
0:35.7	Baristas who have been keeping America caffeinated
0:38.1	throughout the global pandemic
0:39.6	want Starbucks to give them a jolt.
0:42.7	They're asking for more pay
0:44.1	and better working conditions.
0:46.4	And at a few Buffalo stores,
0:48.1	they're even talking about forming
0:49.5	the first union in Starbucks 50-year history.
0:53.2	Starbucks executives have spent months trying to stop that from happening.
0:58.5	And tonight, in a hotel ballroom filled with executives and employees, many of whom are
1:04.0	wearing Starbucks trademark green aprons, the company's anti-union push will come to a head
1:09.7	with a speech from Starbucks' legendary former
1:12.6	CEO, Howard Schultz.
1:15.4	So welcome Howard Schultz.
1:21.7	As he soaks in the cheers, Schultz projects a relaxed coffee house vibe.
1:30.4	The man who built Starbucks from a sleepy Seattle coffee cellar into a billion-dollar behemoth is wearing a tan, cardigan, khakis, and brown suede
	...

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