Starbucks founder, chairman and chief executive Howard Schultz has said that the global coffee chain behemoth is still in its “early days of growth”.
In an interview with CNBC in the US, Schultz said: “Despite being a public company for 20 years Starbucks is in the early days of its growth and development.”
He said he believed that Starbucks brand and its products will be as embraced in other parts of the world, as enthusiastically as they are here, in the US.
He said: “We have 1000 stores already in China and in years to come we will have thousands more.”
He also reiterated plans for the brand to expand in India and many other parts of the developing world.
He said that the price of coffee has come down more than 30% from its highs earlier this year. “What was once a major headwind is now a major tailwind.”
Starbucks is currently renovating about 1,700 of its stores to drive more traffic.
Schultz said that if there was one thing that people and investors should take away from Starbucks it was that: “I tell all our people to stay humble and be hungry – we are a performance driven company through the lens of humanity.”
