Finally, some good news from Starbucks: the coffee-shop behemoth is closing 600 stores and cutting 12,000 jobs, roughly 7% of its global workforce.
This is a gutsy move for founder Howard Schultz, who just recently retook the helm with broad pronouncements of returning to roots and reigniting the "emotional attachment with customers" that has been lost over time. After all, Starbucks now has 16,226 locations, up from just 1,886 over the last 10 years. With operations in such faraway lands as Lebanon, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Argentina, and Romania, Starbucks' expansionist future once seemed boundless.
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