Schultz Returns to Starbucks Helm

Starbucks yesterday ousted CEO Jim Donald yesterday and said that, effective immediately, Chairman Howard Schultz will take on the additional role.

Schultz, 54 years old, came to the Seattle coffee company in 1982 when it had four locations and nurtured it to become the empire it is today. Serving as CEO from 1987 to 2000, he presided over the company's 1992 public offering. Starbucks now has more than 15,000 locations around the globe, products on supermarket shelves, and its own record label. In a letter posted to the company's website, Schultz wrote that he will work to fix a coffee empire that become stifled b bureaucracy and has lost the courage that helped it change how Americans get their coffee.