Review: Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul

Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul by Howard Schultz
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I found this book at Dog-eared books and grabbed it and, although it was cheap, I feel cheated. Am I the only one who thought that the title: "Onward: How Starbucks Fought for Its Life without Losing Its Soul" sounds like it would describe how he built up the company? Isn't that what most people wish to read about a successful company? 

But he skips over that part. 

The book races through the early years in the first chapter, saying he wanted to open a coffee shop, so he got an investment (how?) and opened a couple branches (how did that work? How about hiring people? Setting up a system? Finding suppliers? Troubleshooting?), and then bought out Starbucks thanks to another bigger investment (once again, how?), and expanded to a bunch of countries (and again, no details). Chapter 2 he talks about retiring as CEO and becoming Chairman (Sorry, "chairman", since he said they changed all their titles to lower case). 

I generally like the "naive" outlook, for lack of a better word, and I appreciate and try to absorb it when I read it in founders' books. I understand that if you wish to create a world-changing company you need to be naive enough to actually believe the world can change, and I guess I sort of hope it rubs off on me. However, very often this book struck me as more self-adulatory and as an opportunity to give his version of various handpicked events. 

There were, however, some great points:

I really liked how SB offers healthcare to all its employees, even part-timers, in addition to stock in the company. 

I especially liked how a Starbucks in Tokyo offered coffee tastings to the visually impaired a few times a year, and the chapter on China had some touching points. 

Reading through a list of Schultz's other books, I see one called "Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built a Company One Cup at a Time", which I will assume is the actual story of how he grew Starbucks. I do wish he had made the content of this one more obvious, for those of us shopping in used bookstores that give us a 30 minute time limit before we have to leave (COVID restrictions). 

Still, some interesting points. 

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