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Comment by hangonhn | Hacker News Reader

I see what you're saying. Here's the CNBC version of it:

https://www.cnbc.com/2017/10/04/bill-gates-sr-helped-howard-...

It sounds like the Starbucks owners already offered it to Schultz and gave him 90 days to buy it and it was an exclusive offer. Part way through fundraising, an Il Giornale investor caught wind of it and approached Starbucks with a higher bid. I think the fact that Starbucks had offered it to Schultz first and then his own investor tried to undermine him and Il Giornale is sort of rotten and underhanded. I think the fact that Starbucks had offered it to Schultz first and agreed on a price and Il Giornale's own investor tried to undermine the deal is where things get a little shady.

Apologies for telling the story poorly and missing some important details.

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Fast forward to today and Howard Schultz is despised in the Seattle area.

His presidential bid was DOA.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/29/howard-schul...

> Fast forward to today and Howard Schultz is despised in the Seattle area.

Did you even read the story? The founders wanted to make more coffee, Schultz wanted to make more stores. Seattle used to have an amazing coffee culture, and starbucks largely killed that. Schultz rightly gets the lion's share of the blame for that

I'm not sure Starbucks would erode a places coffee culture, even in Seattle. If anything it would expand the pool of potential customers. I love and drink a lot of gourmet coffee/beans. I also visit Starbucks on occasion. I never go to Starbucks specifically for their coffee though, unless there is no good local cafe in the area. Starbucks is a lightweight coworking space / 3rd space at this stage.

Their predatory business practice killed a lot of local cafes. Places that were funky, cool, focused on their product and had a loyal base of locals but were kept afloat by tourists and other passersby who wouldn't cross a street, or just fell for brand recognition. They'd set up shop across the street or around the corner, and operate at a loss until they drove the locals off.

I'm loathe to admit that starbucks quality has gone up a bit lately, but even today their standard pull is burnt to hell in the name of homogeneity. So yeah, they dealt a huge blow to Seattle's (and many other cities) local cafes, and replaced them with a sanitized lack of culture.

For sure what you said happened however I’d argue it’s not a problem in places with legit coffee culture. Australia, Berlin, London to name a few places I’m intimately familiar with. Singapore on the other hand it most definitely is but that is a good reflection of the city tbh.

I'm from Singapore, and would fight you on your claim that Starbucks killed the local coffee culture. We have our own coffee culture, historically in the hawker centres, and it's most definitely still striving. Beyond that, there are tons of third wave coffee cafes that arrived in the past decade, mainly because of Australian influence. They're just not located at the shopping malls due to rental, where Starbucks and its ilk dominate.

Yes sorry I was comparing like for like and not kopi. I do love Singaporean hawker coffee culture. I’m going by experience from living in the heartland for a few years where the only 2 western cafes are coffee bean and Starbucks. They leave no space for a local alternative.

Definitely really good western café’s in Singapore too. Ronin is prob my favourite..... looks like they had to close :(

> in places with legit coffee culture

What about places with a newly-growing coffee culture?

What about places with a coffee culture whose strength is starting to temporarily weaken?

What about places which occasionally undergo change?

Yes there definitely is a case to be made. It’s more a criticism of capitalism imo

I agree, and I suspect Starbucks had other problems even in cities without much of a specialty or creative coffee culture (so, excluding London, Berlin, Melbourne, and I would add SF and a few others here).

For instance, many cities in southern and perhaps central Europe seem to have local cafes that don't do anything "special" with their coffee (what's a Chemex?) besides just existing as a local institution for decades with a consistent experience in quality and pricing, and that's something that I expect is very difficult for Starbucks or any foreign player to break into regardless of the quality or international popularity of the brand.

Starbucks didn't kill it. Consumers did. Startbucks came to Australia and mostly failed (had to close lots of stores) as the local coffee culture is very strong. Starbucks was mostly ignored.

The stores that remain in Australia don't even belong to Starbucks popper. https://insideretail.com.au/news/7-eleven-buys-starbucks-201...

popper? or proper?

Does Starbucks corporation actually own Starbucks-branded coffeeshops in most countries other than the US? I thought usually it’s some local whale (like Maxim’s in HK/Macau) that buys the rights to the trademark and opens shops.

> Starbucks didn't kill it. Consumers did.

Starbucks seems to act as if it has a habit of making quarterly plans and mostly executing according to that intent.

But when I look at Consumers as a single entity it seems remarkably undisciplined. It can't seem to hold any plan in mind, coordinate its actions with any moment-to-moment follow-through on, or even _agree_ on a single intended plan. -- Consumers acts like it has no Chief Executive Function!

since when is the seattle coffee culture largely dead? o_O

Yeah - i'm confused by that statement. You would think it's only starbucks in town, when it's not.

Totally agree. Claiming Starbucks killed Seattle coffee culture is a total joke. There are plenty of funky, independent coffee houses to support if you're willing to look for them. The price is generally higher than Starbucks, but so is the quality of the coffee.

"If you're willing to look for them" is kinda the issue. In the mid-late 90s, the independent shops were a significant majority. Now, even Vivace feels like a chain and the quality of their pull has tanked.

Nah fam. He sold the Sonics.

He sucks.

>interrupted by hecklers, with one shouting: “Don’t help elect Trump...

Sounds more like people were not keen on Trump

Tough call.

If you and I handshake on buying my house, you’re rightfully upset when I sell to someone else for more.

On the other hand, all we had is a handshake, so I’m rightfully upset when you chase off a higher bid.

I guess how shady depends on the agreement that Schultz had. The fact that Sr was able to chase them off suggests the agreement was at least of some substance.

As someone who buys and sells a lot of equipment and machine tools having someone sell to someone else after you have a deal is far more infuriating than getting "oh but I would have paid 20% more" after you sealed a deal.

In SV fundraising deals, going back on a handshake is considered pretty bad behavior. Investors stand to lose many future deals if they break one without a darn good reason. Discovering a serious misrepresentation is such a reason, but seeing a better deal elsewhere is not.

The point of handshake deals is to give everyone time to get the details right, without the pressure of having the deal stolen. Forcing parties to rush through the details damages the whole ecosystem, so everyone is motivated to encourage everyone else to respect handshake deals.

I did not know this raising my last round, but it was legit. The money was as good as wired.

That happened to us and on this VC firm's maiden round. They offered no reason except that they reconsidered. Wasted months of our time.

Our attorney (from Fenwick & West) told us the same, that it would damage the VCs reputation and that this was pretty much unheard of for them.

But I never heard another thing about it and that VC firm seems to not be having too much trouble filling out their rounds.

A handshake agreement could very well be a valid, binding contract if certain conditions are met. I would be very cautious about backing out of such an agreement without talking to a lawyer. (And it's a pretty bad look to go back on your word, even when you're legally in the clear.)

I am not a lawyer, but from the legal point of view, a handshake agreement is not a legal binding contract. An exchange is needed to make it binding, even if it's a small amount like a dollar.

At least, that's what I (mis-)remembered from a Contract Law 101 course taken long ago during my undergrad days.

A valid contract requires consideration. That's one of the conditions I was referring to. A handshake and a deposit, for instance, could result in losing a lot more than just the deposit. However, not all consideration is monetary, which is why it helps to consult an expert.

I am not a lawyer, either. Just an engineer with the minimum legal training required for licensure, which is basically, "know when you should ask for help."

This is right, but misleading. Consideration isn't the big question in this thread. It's whether or not a verbal agreement can be binding.

In some cases it can be, but a mere agreement to agree is not binding.

The biggest takehome is 'consult with legal before making promises or representations to counterparties".

Edited this a few times to keep it as short as possible without being misleading.

That's not really correct - you just have to promise to exchange something. If you and I shake on a deal to buy your car for $100, that can certainly be legally binding if we intended it to be so.

Usually, though, handshake deals mean "these are the commercial terms, let's go draw up the contract", which isn't legally binding. In many places, though, they're respected by convention and protected by reputation.

This is wrong.

A handshake deal is a contract. Breaking that contract (and the law) just because it's hard to prove in court is at the depth of depravity.

Just FYI, handshake deals can be valid contracts if certain requirements are met. For one thing, there needs to be enough specificity around the material deal points. Even if you have a written contract but you haven't agreed on the material deal points (for fundraising, this would be things like valuation, type of shares, number of shares/percent of company) then you don't have a valid contract.

There are some things that are on the fence in terms of materiality. For example, is the valuation pre- or post-money? Is there an option pool set aside?

Lastly, there are some types of agreements that cannot be done just on a handshake — there has to be a written agreement in order to be enforceable. IIRC from my law school days, this includes the sale of real estate and a contract that, by its terms, cannot be completed in a year. The latter excludes things that are known to take more than a year, like building a skyscraper. It would include "pet-sit my dog for 13 months while I'm vacationing", for example.

> Breaking that contract (and the law)

Breaking a contract is typically not breaking the law.

That's a bid mind boggling for me. Let's say we have a contract. You break it. So I'm not happy, I suppose I take you to the court.

And there, something is enforced that is not the law but where you are lawfully obliged to a sanction afterwards ?

I don't really understand why you'd say that ? Isn't the law kind of saying "you shall not break contracts" ? And if it's not, what's the point of a contract ?

My comment was typed quickly and was pretty non-specific, so I'm sorry about that and I probably deserved the downvotes. However, I maintain that under most people's understanding of the terms "breaking a contract" and "illegal", breaking a contract is not illegal.

Regarding "breaking a contract": Contracts often stipulate penalties for non-performance of terms within them. For example, you contract with me to rent my house for 5 years. The contract stipulates that if you leave early, I am entitled to keep the deposit. In common language, people will refer to leaving early as "breaking the contract", but there is nothing illegal about doing so.

Regarding "illegal": If the contract does not specify some penalty for non-performance of a clause, or it does specify one but you somehow avoid the penalty, then it would become a matter for the courts, but importantly, it would be a civil court, not a criminal court. You have not broken a law, you have broken a contract, and the civil courts will determine how this situation will be made right.

Well, I thank you for replying, it makes things clearer !

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