Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX, SEHK: 4337) is a large multinational chain of coffee shops with corporate headquarters in Seattle, Washington. Its coffee shops in the U.S. are especially popular among students and young urban professionals. The company was in part named after Starbuck, a character in Moby Dick, and its insignia is a stylized cartoon siren.

In addition to coffee, Starbucks shops also serve other drinks, both hot and cold, and pastries. Many of their stores are inside other retail locations such as supermarkets and bookstores. As a general rule, Starbucks does not offer promotional prices on its products, which tend to be higher than those of competitors.

According to the company's fact sheet, as of February 2006, Starbucks had 6,216 company-operated outlets worldwide: 5,028 of them in the United States and 1,188 in other countries and U.S. territories. In addition, the company has 4,585 joint-venture and licensed outlets, 2,633 of them in the United States and 1,952 in other countries and U.S. territories.

The first Starbucks was opened in Seattle in 1971 by three partners—English teacher Jerry Baldwin, history teacher Zev Siegel, and writer Gordon Bowker. The three were inspired by Alfred Peet, who they knew personally, to open their first store in Pike Place Market to sell high-quality coffee beans and equipment. (This location is still open today, though it is not in the same exact location it was when it opened.) During their first year of operation, they purchased green coffee beans from Peet's, then began buying directly from growers.

Entrepreneur Howard Schultz joined the company in 1982, and, after a trip to Milan, suggested that the company sell coffee, espresso, and cappuccino drinks as well as beans. The owners rejected this idea, believing that getting into the beverage business would distract the company from its focus. To them, coffee was something to be prepared in the home. Certain there was much money to be made selling drinks to on-the-go Americans, Schultz started the Il Giornale coffee bar chain in 1985.

In 1984, the original owners, led by Baldwin, took the opportunity to purchase Peet's. (Baldwin still works there today.) In 1987 they sold the Starbucks chain to Schultz. Schultz rebranded his Il Giornale outlets as Starbucks and quickly began to expand. Starbucks opened its first locations outside Seattle in Vancouver, British Columbia (at Waterfront Station) and Chicago, Illinois that same year. The first Starbucks location outside of North America opened in Tokyo in 1996, and Starbucks now has outlets in 30 additional countries. Starbucks entered the U.K. market in 1998 with the acquisition of the then 60-outlet Seattle Coffee Company, re-branding all its stores as Starbucks.

Starbucks' success in the U.S. market has often, though not always, been replicated around the world; it has faced competition in markets which are already saturated with coffee products, though Starbucks consistently distinguishes itself with its quality of service and of product. A number of retailers have emulated Starbucks' business model, many owned by former Starbucks employees who founded their own businesses upon their knowledge of Starbucks' operations.

(Starbucks Information Courtesy of Wikipedia.)