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" China traditionally has been a tea-drinking country but we turned them into coffee drinkers. "

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" 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.' "

" I despise research. I think it's a crutch. "

" I always saw myself wanting to do something deemed successful and good at the same time. "

" Post-9/11, we saw an immediate uptick in the amount of people in our stores, all over the country. People wanted that human connection. We are not going to fracture the Starbucks experience. "

" Our history is based on extending the brand to categories within the guardrails of Starbucks. "

" Managing and navigating through a financial crisis is no fun at all. "

" Most business people today are not going to invest in the uncertainty that exists in America. "

" I think there is probably no better person to aspire to emulate than Steve Jobs and what he has done at Apple in terms of his leadership, his innovation, not settling for mediocrity. "

" I was born on the other side of the tracks, in public housing in Brooklyn, New York. My dad never made more than $20,000 a year, and I grew up in a family that lost health insurance. So I was scarred at a young age with understanding what it was like to watch my parents lose access to the American dream. "

" I was working probably at the age of 10, when I had my first paper route. I had every different kind of job you could possibly imagine as a young kid. "

" You can't build any kind of organization if you're not going to surround yourself with people who have experience and skill base beyond your own. "

Surround Yourself

" We sell tea in Starbucks, but I think the experience is very different. I think coffee is something that is quick - it's transactional. I think tea is more Zen-like. It requires a different environment. "

" When you're building a business or joining a company, you have to be transparent; you can't have two sets of information for two sets of people. "

" Starbucks has stores in America in many, many communities that are governed by many, many different municipalities. Starbucks cannot dictate to a municipality in Cincinnati or Kansas City or Sacramento how or why or when there should be a recycling program. "

" People ask me what's the most important function when you're starting an organization or setting up the kind of culture and values that are going to endure. The discipline I believe so strongly in is H.R., and its the last discipline that gets funded. "

" We can't wait for Washington. Business leaders are going to have to galvanize their own constituencies and do everything they can to demonstrate confidence in the economy, and I think that can be contagious. "

" Great companies that build an enduring brand have an emotional relationship with customers that has no barrier. And that emotional relationship is on the most important characteristic, which is trust. "

" California, in a sense, is almost Starbucks' largest country, with almost 3,000 stores. "

" My parents really wanted me to get out of New York, be exposed to other people, other ways of life. "

" My father had a series of blue-collar jobs and never made more than $20,000 a year. When I was seven, he got injured on a job. That was a very important point - because of the injury, he couldn't walk, and the company he was working for did not pay him. There was no compensation. So there was no money and no food. "

" You walk into a retail store, whatever it is, and if there's a sense of entertainment and excitement and electricity, you wanna be there. "

" Cutting prices or putting things on sale is not sustainable business strategy. "

" I'm in a different position than most CEO's. I'm a founder. I'm not a hired CEO. Now, I can be fired by the board, but most CEO's are hired by the board. "

" America's leaders need to put their feet in the shoes of working Americans. "

" My kids probably started drinking coffee in their late teens. "

" Beverages have to be created. And they're created by looking at what trend is in, say, the fashion industry - what color's hot right now. "

" Starbucks represents something beyond a cup of coffee. "

" 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. "

" At an early age, my mother gave me this feeling that anything is possible, and I believe that. "

" I believe life is a series of near misses. A lot of what we ascribe to luck is not luck at all. It's seizing the day and accepting responsibility for your future. It's seeing what other people don't see And pursuing that vision. "