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Starbucks Facing Brand Culture Devaluation and Massive Layoffs

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Starbucks Facing Brand Culture Devaluation and Massive Layoffs
Starbucks facing brand culture devaluation and massive layoffs
To: Howard Schultz, Starbucks
From: Yang LU, Aspire

CC: Rui DONG
Xiaochen DONG
Vanessa BAXTER Pushpak BERIWAL

Executive summary
The aim of this report is to find out the deep-seated reason for this depression of Starbucks and give a recommendation to the firm to deal with it. Furthermore, this report also suggests solutions to dismiss the panic of the staff and remains the excellent performance.

The key findings include:
Finding 1: The over-expansion made Starbucks’ unique culture of the “Starbucks experience” devalued and seemed no difference with other fast food restaurants. This caused employees’ less well performance and therefore it lost customers’ loyalty as well.
Finding 2:The employees felt dissatisfied with the rewards and treated customers with less effort while the unacceptable massive layoffs made a panic.

The recommendations suggested by this report include:
Recommendation 1:“Decentralization”-- Remove number of outlets away from each other and slow down the pace of opening new stores in the US or concentrate on the unexploited market space in other countries.
Recommendation 2:Increasing the compensation given to the members asked to leave and suggesting them do some other suitable jobs. The firm can also make a promise that these employees would be considered first when hiring candidates in the future after the most difficult times. Furthermore, keep the employees’ payment stable and hold some activities inspiring to promote people to tide Starbucks over difficulties together.

This report describes the findings after applying theories to analyse the issue which claimed the trouble that Starbucks was facing. For years, Starbucks was famous for its consistent growing and expansion. However, the both share price and sales fell even three times than before since 2008. The “Starbucks experience” (Michelle, 2007) was widely supposed to have been diluted and the

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