Inside Starbucks’ commitment to thriving communities

Episode transcript, edited for clarity

[00:00:28] Bill: Welcome to Retail Gets Real, where we talk with retail's most fascinating leaders about the industry that impacts everyone, everywhere, every day.

On today's episode, I'm going to be talking with Kelly Goodejohn. She is the Chief Social Impact Officer at Starbucks. We're going to talk about food share in action. We're going to be talking about her journey to social impact and what does that mean for the communities that Starbucks and other retailers serve across this country. Kelly, welcome to Retail Gets Real.

[00:01:01] Kelly: Hi, Bill. It is great to be here. Thanks for having me.

[00:01:04] Bill: Now tell me about your role, and I'm very intrigued about what led you to Starbucks.

[00:01:12] Kelly: Sure, sure. So I have the privilege of serving as Starbucks Chief Social Impact Officer, as you mentioned. And my responsibility is to ensure that we are contributing positively to the communities that we're a part of. I think you are very familiar as you started with that we're a community coffee house.

We're in thousands of communities around the world, and we take that role very seriously. Not just serving that third place where people can engage and connect, but also the ability to make a difference in the community. And that's the work that my team and myself do, working across all of our 450,000 partners around the world.

[00:01:50] Bill: That's a lot.

[00:01:51] Kelly: Yeah. Some of the other things that we do that are really important to strengthen communities, we're there during times of disaster. So through the Starbucks Foundation, we're investing in disaster response and making sure that we can be there and support communities as they need to.

We invite our employees, which we call partners. So we invite our partners each year to nominate local nonprofits that are doing really good things in their community. This year we had a record 56,000 nominations from our baristas and partners, and we're proud to say that we're awarding $5.4 million beginning this week to over 3,200 hyper-local nonprofits that our partners care about.

And we also support all of the volunteering efforts in the ways our partners can engage in their local communities. So that's a snapshot of the role that I play. And how I got here, I would say that since I was young, just doing good in the world was part of who I was, and I've been fortunate to get this opportunity to do this work at Starbucks, leaning into both sustainability and the impact that we can make in communities through a business and through our partners.

[00:02:58] Bill: Yeah. I was just having a conversation earlier with someone. It's intriguing to me that people and how we talk about the impact that we have in the communities that we serve as retailers. And some are really good at it, some of them aren't. In terms of talking about it, making sure that people know we are there, and we are making a difference.

There's a fine line there, where you want to make sure that people know, but you don't want people to think that you're just doing it because you want them to feel good about your work. But it's the record that you guys have. Nobody could assume that. You've been doing it for a long time.

[00:03:35] Kelly: We have been, and I would say it's part of the values of our company and our commitment. And when I think about who is that audience, it's our partners. Our partners want to do good in the world, know their neighbors. They know their community members. They're interacting with them each and every day.

There's an expectation that Starbucks is stepping up and doing good. I would say I'm fortunate because it has been rooted in our DNA since the beginning. We're a mission-driven company. So that has not been an issue. And I think we just authentically are there.

[00:04:07] Bill: Correct. The authentic side of that is so incredibly important. Let's talk a little bit about the social mission and the food share in action. Tell me a little bit about that.

[00:04:18] Kelly: Sure, thanks for asking. It was almost 10 years ago when we started hearing from our partners, our baristas, saying, "We do not want to throw away unsold food at the end of the day." And we had to because of food safety regulations. And so Starbucks, hearing our partners, said, "We need to do better. Let's see what's possible out there."

And it started through some iterations, but eventually we launched a nationwide food rescue program all because of our partners’ feedback and voice to us saying, "What else can we do?" First and foremost, we needed to look at food safety.

What program could we develop that could very quickly get food in a temperature-controlled way to food banks? How could we ensure that it was safe? How could we ensure that it was operationally easy for our baristas at the end of the day to do? And so we were able to do that. And the way we did that was by finding a partner.

Feeding America in the U.S. and Second Harvest in Canada stepped up to the plate and said, "We want to iterate on this with you." Today what that looks like is, at the end of the day, any unsold food, it's packaged up. Our baristas will put it into bags, keep it in the refrigerator. And what's so great is that every night we have delivery trucks coming to our stores, our coffee houses, that are delivering milk and other products.

And so that delivery driver will pick up the food donation bags in the refrigerator, put it into a refrigerated truck, and then along their delivery routes, will collect all the different coffeehouse-donated food, bring it to a centralized distribution center, where then immediately gets aggregated and sent out to Feeding America food banks across the United States and Canada.

[00:06:16] Bill: That's awesome.

[00:06:17] Kelly: If you think about the scale, this is happening 365 days a year across 10,000 coffeehouses. And within 12 to 24 hours, the food is getting into the hands of our community members who are hungry. What I'm so proud of is, this is serving a community need. It is also keeping enormous amounts of product out of landfills. So there's both a sustainability opportunity here and progress as well as certainly driving our community need and contributing positively.

[00:06:54] Bill: It's a great program. You're doing something that I wish more could or would. I always think about when you go to these meetings or to these large events there's buffets and food. It's over, and you look at all the food and you think, God, this could feed a lot of people.

And the fact that it was recognized by your partners, by others, and saying, “what can we do?” It really does set the bar, I think, for others to follow. In conversations that you've had with other companies, is there an interest in terms of them learning from your experience?

[00:07:29] Kelly: Absolutely, absolutely. And we, of course, continue to learn from others. I would say we're in a position where we do have some packaged food, which I think a lot of organizations who have packaged food, food that is shelf-stable, that's some of the easier things to donate. You can put it aside and get that donated. But perishable, fresh food, that's trickier.

That's where we had to put a lot of effort into making sure that the systems were in place to make sure that the food safety was there along the way. And that's where we hear a lot of interest from others. How can we do something like this? I think the other interesting side of this is, we tapped into an existing strength that we had, which was our logistics service.

When we first started this, we actually had food banks after hours coming into our coffeehouses, collecting the food, and driving it to food banks. And that seemed like a good approach in the beginning, but then we thought, how do you scale that across 10,000 stores relying on food bank volunteers to do that every single night?

And we knew that just wasn't sustainable and scalable. And this is a lot of what we share with others. This is where Feeding America said, "We have this network of food banks." And the unique thing that Starbucks does is, we're paying for the drivers to take the food to the food banks.

We are removing the burden of the food banks to have to get the food. All they have to do is get it to the people that they're connected with. That's a really unique thing that we're doing and a key component of what we share with others. If I can, I want to share one other thing we do that's unique and that has piqued interest from others.

Because we're donating food, we get a tax benefit. There's a federal enhanced food tax benefit that we get. Unique to Starbucks, we have committed to reinvesting 100% of that tax benefit back into hunger relief efforts. So to date, we've invested over $93 million on food rescue and hunger relief efforts.

Not only does it cover the program cost of the logistics side, the refrigerated trucks, but we're also providing grants to all of these food banks so that they can continue to feed more people. That might mean complementing the Starbucks-donated food with other food, like fruits and vegetables. Or that may mean enabling food banks, smaller food pantries to buy refrigerators or other equipment so that they can reach more individuals. So leaning into logistics, reinvesting our tax benefit into food, equity grants, are really two of the key learnings that we'd like to pass along.

[00:10:12] Bill: That's fantastic. It's so funny. And I'm glad you said something because in the back of my mind I was saying — the people that are a little too bitter would say, "Well, they get a tax break for it." You do, and then you reinvest. And that is 100%. That's amazing. That's a huge commitment, and that's a lot of money.

[00:10:31] Kelly: It is, and we're going to continue to do more.

[00:10:34] Bill: You continue to learn from your own experience and from others, but what is the most challenging part of this initiative, do you think?

[00:10:42] Kelly: I would say as we were developing it, the scale was an enormous challenge. Knowing that food has a shelf life. It needs to get into the hands of individuals within a 24-hour period. You have 10,000 coffeehouses that you need to do, and doing this every single day. So I would say that was the most significant challenge that we needed to overcome.

The easy part was asking our baristas to pull the food together because so many were enormously excited to be able to have this venue and opportunity. And in fact, what we've seen is that our partners not only are donating food, but they're now volunteering with these food banks in record amounts.

Last week I had the chance to visit the Three Square food bank in Las Vegas that's serving the southern Nevada area. They're just doing incredible things as far as feeding their community. But on top of that, we have partners in the area who are there all the time, volunteering their time to help support the mission of the food bank.

They're getting food from Starbucks. They're getting funding from Starbucks. But then also, our partners are giving their time. And so it's just really a beautiful system when you see it all coming together.

[00:12:02] Bill: Yeah. That's what community is all about.

[00:12:04] Kelly: That's right.

[00:12:05] Bill: So you have a very unique job, Kelly. Most people don't realize that many companies and certainly in retail have a very real focus on social impact. But that gives you an interesting view of what retail is and how retail can impact people's lives beyond just buying things or store visits or being online. What do you love most about retail?

[00:12:34] Kelly: What I love most is the opportunity to make an impact at scale, leveraging business, in ways that we can engage our employees, engage our customers. I think that's a really unique ability that retail has. I would say, especially in the instance of Starbucks where you have physical places in communities, we're serving as this community hub. And so that would be my answer to that question.

[00:13:05] Bill: You didn't start out and go to the University of Washington and say, "Boy, I really want to be a chief social impact officer someday." Or did you?

[00:13:13] Kelly: I did not. I did not. I just knew that I wanted to do something where it could equate to doing some good in the world, no matter what that role was.

[00:13:24] Bill: I think that kind of answers my next question that I thought of, which is what inspires you? But I'm going to ask it anyway. What inspires you every single day? You have that North Star. What is that?

[00:13:34] Kelly: Every single day when I go into my coffeehouse and I order my drink and I engage with our partners, that inspires me, really, truly. Our partners are incredible, and they have such an appreciation and love for their community, and that fills my cup each and every day.

[00:13:51] Bill: Oh, that's awesome. That's a double Venti. All right, so you mentioned that you go to your Starbucks and you get your order. Well, what is your order? What is your favorite Starbucks order?

[00:14:02] Kelly: So right now I'm drinking an Americano. I start my day off with an Americano. I love hot coffee. But when I go to iced, it's iced shaken brown sugar oat milk espresso, which is an incredible beverage. Incredible.

[00:14:22] Bill: It sounds incredible.

[00:14:24] Kelly: What I love is it's still super-coffee forward. I love coffee. And so you really get that strong coffee coming through, and it's refreshing, and it's delicious.

[00:14:34] Bill: I love strong coffee too. I had the opportunity to study at University of Oslo in Norway, and they would have this afternoon break, and they would bring out coffee. And I wrote to my parents, and I said, "The recipe for this coffee are cigarette butts, charcoal ashes and brewing coffee grounds for at least 10 hours." And I loved it. So when I came back to the States, I was like, "Mm-mm, got to find my go-to coffee.” And I love my Americano every morning, my Venti Americano, 2% milk and three Stevias.

[00:15:09] Kelly: And you know what the right way to drink coffee is? However you like it.

[00:15:15] Bill: My dad used to say, you spend way too much time doctoring that coffee. Just drink it black. But he was in the Navy, and I think that's all he knew. So yeah, whatever. I get it, and I love it, and I'm just going to continue doing what I do.

In terms of retail's impact, certainly in the social realm, what is that future for those programs? What is that future for retail and for those customers and communities that we serve?

[00:15:35] Kelly: It's a great question. I think, given where the world is today, increasing disconnection or loneliness, I think retail, serving as those community hubs, is a really interesting space for all of us to be thinking about. There's a unique value that retail brings to communities.

I also think, as I've talked about, leaning into our employee base more. Really listening to what our employees expect from us, and engaging with our employees in solving problems. And I would say we all need to be really good listeners within the communities that we're a part of. Not assume that we know the answers, not assume that we understand the challenges. And really listen so that together we can collectively make our community stronger.

[00:16:24] Bill: The work that you're doing, the impact that you're having, the lives that you're helping to find something better for themselves, that's the Starbucks story. Kelly Goodejohn, it has been such a distinct pleasure talking to you and learning more about the food share program that is helping in communities around this country and around the globe.

[00:16:43] Kelly: Thank you, Bill. Really appreciate the time.

[00:16:45] Bill: And thank you all for listening to another episode of Retail Gets Real. You can find more information about this episode at retail gets real dot com. I'm Bill Thorne. This is Retail Gets Real. Thanks again for listening. Until next time.