Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – The Starbucks coffee franchise immediately became central anger due to the escalating Israeli occupation of Palestine. There are quite a few calls for a boycott from the world’s largest coffee brand, which is often said to support Israel.
Despite the chaos that occurred, Starbucks gained success thanks to Jewish billionaire Howard Schultz. Starting from 11 outlets, thanks to Schultz, Starbucks was able to have 33 thousand outlets spread across many countries.
In 2018, Schultz resigned from his position as CEO. However, in 2022 he will return to being interim CEO because he wants to appoint a new person to lead this company.
Schultz is considered an inspiration because of his life story. This man was born into a difficult family. Are you curious about Schultz’s life story? Here’s the review.
Living poor in Brooklyn
Schultz was born in Brooklyn, New York, 1953 to a family of Ashkenazi Jewish descent. His father, Fred Schultz, was a former military man who ended up working as a driver. But unfortunately, Fred Schultz lost his job after he was involved in an accident.
When the accident occurred, Fred had no health insurance at all and was unable to pay for medical expenses.
It was this incident that ultimately made the Schultz family’s economy worse. At the age of 12, Howard Schultz was already working to help his parents.
His jobs included delivering newspapers and being a cafe waiter. And when Schultz was 16 years old, he worked as a shopkeeper.
Achievement in sports
One of Schultz’s talents is in the field of sports. Schultz has a strong physique, and that is what makes him successful in achieving achievements.
Through his achievements, Schultz managed to get a college scholarship and enter Northern Michigan University majoring in communications.
After graduating from college in 1975, Schultz worked at Xerox for three years as sales manager. His career could be said to have been smooth, but in the end he resigned and moved to the Swedish company, Hammaplast. It was at that company that he finally met the Starbucks coffee shop.
Become a Starbucks employee
When Schultz visited Starbucks, Starbucks was just a small coffee shop founded by Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl, and Gordon Bowker. However, Schultz, who was 29 years old at the time, saw a hidden gem at Starbucks. That’s what attracted him to work there.
Schultz’s desire to work at Starbucks finally came true, Schultz was placed in the marketing division.
Just for your information, when working at Starbucks, Schultz received a much lower salary than when working at Hammaplast. And what was most surprising, Schutlz’s salary at Starbucks was less than half his salary at Hammaplast! Not to mention, he had to move to Seattle.
After a year working at Starbucks, Schultz was sent to Italy to gain knowledge about the coffee industry. That’s where he finally got new inspiration for developing the Starbucks business.
According to him, apart from making coffee, Starbucks must also design a cafe that is comfortable for visitors. Why is that? Because in Italy, many people spend hours just enjoying coffee.
Unfortunately, this idea was rejected because it was thought to be detrimental to Starbucks. Starbucks officials at that time had very conservative thinking.
Schultz also decided to leave Starbucks and set up his own coffee shop in Seattle with capital of US$ 1.7 million.
Il Giornale
This Italian name was used by Schultz for the name of his new coffee shop. Il Giornale also managed to achieve success.
In founding Il Giornale, Schultz also had to fight tooth and nail, especially in seeking loan funds. Schultz bluntly said that he had asked 242 people for help, and 217 of them flatly refused.
Back to Starbucks
During his two years at Il Giornale, Schultz heard news that the owner of Starbucks intended to sell its stores, coffee-making equipment and name. brands Starbucks itself. They offered a selling price of USD 4 million.
Schultz immediately lobbied all parties to borrow funds. It is quite interesting to know that Bill Gates turned out to be the first investor in Starbucks.
After receiving sufficient capital, Schultz returned to Starbucks, but not as an employee, but as the new owner.
The birth of today’s Starbucks
Under Schultz’s leadership, Starbucks became successful. In 1992, Starbucks had 165 outlets with total net revenues of US$ 93 million. They also did an IPO.
And in 2000, Starbucks was officially present in a number of countries go international. It was through this coffee shop that finally made Schultz rich.
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(aak/aak)