Hiring people is an art, not a science, and resumes can't tell you whether someone will fit into a company's culture.

I am concerned about any attrition in customer traffic at Starbucks, but I don't want to use the economy, commodity prices or consumer confidence as an excuse.

The success of the Starbucks has been based on this balance between profitability and a social conscience. Everywhere we're doing business, were trying to manage the business through the lens of humanity.

We have a big opportunity in China. We think the number of stores here can rival the number in North America.

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

What I would say to young entrepreneurs is there's so many moments in your life where you have these dreams, and people are trying to protect you, and they say, perhaps, friends, family, parents sometimes, they don't agree with it, they think, 'This is just too high of a hurdle.' And I don't agree with that.

When we began Starbucks, what I wanted to try to do was to create a set of values, guiding principles, and culture.