"I'm not losing any sleep over Dunkin Donuts."

"Beverages have to be created. And they're created by looking at what trend is in, say, the fashion industry - what color's hot right now."

"Turning a culture around is very difficult to do because it's based on a series of many, many decisions, and the organization is framed by those decisions."

"There's this myth that has been exacerbated by others that Starbucks means a $4 cup of coffee, which is not true."

"Even though people are under economic pressure, they still want to support those brands with values that are compatible with their own."

"At an early age, my mother gave me this feeling that anything is possible, and I believe that."

"The response to the Starbucks brand has been phenomenal in our international markets."

"I despise research. I think it's a crutch."

"I love being the underdog."

"Managing a business, small or large, today requires an extremely disciplined, thoughtful approach with regard to the pressure that people are under."

"Managing and navigating through a financial crisis is no fun at all."

"Post-9/11, we saw an immediate uptick in the amount of people in our stores, all over the country. People wanted that human connection. We are not going to fracture the Starbucks experience."

"I think growth covers up mistakes."

"I do think - as self-serving as it sounds - that I was the right person, given the very, very strong headwind we had from the economy and our own issues, to come back and rewrite the future of the company."

"For Starbucks, there will be no shortage of the highest-quality arabica beans. I suspect that for some others there could potentially be a problem, not in the near term, but over time."

"In the 1960s, if you introduced a new product to America, 90% of the people who viewed it for the first time believed in the corporate promise. Then 40 years later if you performed the same exercise, less than 10% of the public believed it was true. The fracturing of trust is based on the fact that the consumer has been let down."

"Just. Plain. [Fu*king.] Grilled. Swordfish."

"This may sound a bit naive, but I got here by believing in big dreams."

"This is not his job, I thought, it's his passion."

"Starbucks has changed the rules of engagement for the music industry."

"Be bold, but be fair. Don't give in. If others around you have integrity, too, you can prevail"

"When you give up,' said a slim older man whose home we rebuilt, 'you might as well lay down and die.' It was obvious that we weren't just giving people back their homes, but also restoring a sense of dignity."

"It's ironic that no matter where I go, I meet people from Brooklyn. I'm proud of that heritage. It's where I'm from, who I am."

"My biggest concern is that America is drifting towards mediocrity and that people don't recognize - and by people I'm meaning Washington - don't recognize the sense of urgency and the fact that I don't think this is a crisis anymore. I think it's an emergency."