“I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach!”
Charles Dickens – A Christmas Carol.
Art – John William Waterhouse (contemporary Christmas adaptation)
In the early ‘80s, Howard Schultz joined the coffee roasting company, Starbucks, as its Marketing Director. On a business trip to Italy, he became fascinated with the country’s coffee house culture, which emphasized the relationship between the barista and the customer. The preparation and presentation of coffee was treated with reverence, done only by trained professionals. Fascinated with this ritual and the sense of community that he felt in Italy’s coffee houses, Schultz returned to the United States and convinced the Starbucks founders to test the Italian coffee house concept. The idea took off and Howard Schultz changed the trajectory of Starbucks forever.
This is the first article of a new section on this blog, Business Story, because #StoriesMatter.
Of course, I illustrate with creatures of the water by John William Waterhouse.
Trail me away
with questions
and the weight of your love.
Abyss is not yet invented
Just seen in shadow moons…
Cast me away
with a thought
replenishing with haze
in mid mountain mornings…
I carry feelings
in my pockets
and stories of you
to guard my garden of lilies…
Every night
I wash myself of you
until another one comes written…
Reposting an old poem from 2015.
Art by John William Waterhouse.
