During a recent trip to Seattle I took the obligatory tour of Pikes Place Market to catch a King Salmon (See pic) and brisk by the original Starbucks. From the outside, it doesn’t look like your garden variety Starbucks. Turns out that this “original” Starbucks never sold coffee when it first opened. Instead, one of the founders, Jerry Baldwin was focused on selling coffee beans, teas and herbs. It wasn’t until former Director of Marketing and current CEO Howard Schultz was on a buying trip to Milan, Italy, for Starbucks, that Schultz noted that coffee bars existed on practically every street. He learned that they not only served excellent espresso, they also served as meeting places or public squares; they were a big part of Italy's societal glue, and there were 200,000 of them in the country. On his return, he tried to persuade Jerry Baldwin to offer traditional espresso beverages in addition to the whole bean coffee, leaf teas and spices they had long offered. After a successful pilot of the cafe concept, Jerry refused to roll it out company-wide, saying they didn't want to get into the restaurant business. Frustrated, Schultz started his own coffee shop in 1985, named 'Il Giornale' after the Milanese newspaper. Two years later, the original Starbucks management (Jerry included) decided to focus on Peet's Coffee & Tea and sold its Starbucks retail unit to Schultz.
But what if Jerry had never created the first “flawed” (I say that loosely) coffee bean shop? What if they had not hired Howard? Without these mistakes, and the associated issues and baggage that came along with the coffee bean shop, you would not be enjoying those double Latte Frappuccino today. Success rarely travels in a straight line.
I think our personal relationships are the same.
When we start dating, we don’t just date the person, but all of there past mistakes and current flaws. The version of her today, and all her associated baggage, is a kluge of sorts-a clumping of her past relationships. The goal then, like Howard, is too remain open enough to find your own inspiration; inspiration that can take a somewhat flawed baggage filled past, to produce a positive loving future.
Share The Water…
Steve Amarante
www.luvjungle.com
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