All's Not Well with Starbucks
IN MARCH 2003, FORTUNE CAME our WITH ITS ANNUAL LIST OF FORTUNE 500 COMPANIES.
For Howard Schultz, Chairman of Starbucks Corp., this list was special as Starbucks fea¬tured in the list. It was a dream come true for the Seattle-based entrepreneur.
Though the U.S. economy was reeling under recession and many major retailers were reporting losses and applying for bankruptcy, Starbucks announced a 31 % increase in its net earnings and a 23% increase in sales for the first quarter of 2003. Analysts felt that the success of Starbucks showed that a quality product speaks for itself. The fact that Starbucks spent less than 1 % of its sales on advertising and marketing strengthened this view. In addition to being a popular brand among customers, Starbucks was also considered the best place to work due to its employee-friendly policies.1 Exhibit 1 shows Starbucks' income statement. See Starbucks' 2002 Annual Report, at http://www.starbucks.com/aboutus/financials.asp, for complete financial statements.
This case was written by K. Subhadra, under the direction of Sanjib Dutta, ICFAI Center for Management Research (ICMR). It is intended to be used as the basis for class discussion rather than to illustrate either effective or ineffec¬tive handling of management situations. This case was compiled from published sources. Copyright © 2003, ICFAI Center for Management Research (ICMR), Hyderbad, India. This case cannot be reproduced in any form without the written permission of the copyright holder, ICFAI Center for Management Research (ICMR). Reprint permission is solely granted to the publisher, Prentice Hall, for the books, Strategic Management and Business Policy—10th E ...