Starbucks and studying don't mix.

Earlier I decided that tonight I needed to spend some time on my note for law journal. Because the library closed at 5 p.m. today, I decided I would go to Starbucks. A decaf cappucino sounded nice, and I assumed the place would be fairly empty considering 1) Btown seems to have slowed down considerably since finals ended; and 2) it was Friday night - surely on a Friday night people would be at the bars, or hanging with friends, or at least not hanging out at a coffee shop. Wrong. Starbucks was quite crowded. The crowd in and of itself was not really much of a problem though; I quickly located a table with outlet access. The real problem was that while half of the people were studying, reading, or otherwise focusing intently, the other half were chattering quite loudly. The din was so loud, in fact, that my Bose noise-canceling headphones could not drown it out. This led to an only semi-productive reading session, which was somewhat disappointing considering I set aside my Friday night to get some work done. Oh well.

To be honest, the transition of most Starbucks from quiet, intellectual havens to noisy, crowded establishments is a phenomenon I have seen developing for some time, however. While all of my evidence is admittedly anecdotal, and drawn from a small sample of stores, this observed change has paralleled Starbucks' transition from a domestic, customer-focused business to a global, volume focused corporation with something like 30,000 stores worldwide. Interestingly, this strategy change does not seem to be working all that well for the Seattle coffee giant. Suffering sales and a declining stock price have led to recent experiments like the move away from the traditional cup design, with the green logo, to one with a new brown logo. Rather than such a simple product packaging switch, perhaps the more appropriate path to stock-price stardom is a return to the company's quiet coffee shop roots, with fewer stores and more focus on the customer. While I do pick up the occasional cup of joe or breakfast sandwich from Starbucks, I would certainly spend more time, and consequently more money, there if I could actually enjoy the Norah Jones playing in the background while reading a novel, the newspaper, or even a casebook.

Moving up yet another level of abstraction (thank you, Don Gjerdingen), this Starbucks story represents a struggle many businesses face as they make the move from local to national to global. How do you encourage innovation and foster growth while still embracing the things that made your business a success in the first place? Many a company has failed to adequately balance these interests (read: Under Armor and Crocs). I don't presume to have the answer to this question, but one day, I would love to run one of these companies and try my hand at the growth-versus-basics balancing act.

First post...

So here it is -- my blog. Having completed the all-important 1L year, I suppose I'll finally sit down and do something I've been contemplating for some time. Considering the next few months and years will have a profound effect on the course of my life, what better time to catalog my thoughts and dreams than now?

I write this as I sit enjoying a good night of sports from my oh-so-comfortable couch. That's right, I actually have time to watch sports now. In real time. Amazing. Later, I will enjoy some DVR before drifting off to sleep. This comes after several days of celebrating combined with relaxation after my last exam on Friday. Yesterday, in fact, several of my friends and I enjoyed, inter alia, a wonderful day on the lake on a double-decker pontoon boat we rented; the purpose was to celebrate my good friend Aditi's birthday. Unfortunately, we did not know that Indiana does not permit alcohol sales on Election Day, so our supply was limited to the few random beverages we could scrounge up collectively. Nonetheless, we still had a blast. And honestly, it was probably best that we didn't have more to drink; I was able to catch up on some sleep and thus have a productive day today.

In addition to investing some time in the note I am writing in pursuit of a law journal position, I ran a few errands and notched a solid workout. Rather than hitting the gym, however, I exercised at home with the new Perfect Pushup apparatus I purchased today at GNC. So that I can easily transport them to NYC for the summer, and when traveling in general, I chose the travel model. The jury is still out on whether or not executing these "perfect" pushups will actually result in less strain on my right shoulder than traditional pushups. I will report back in a few days on this topic.

Also, I was able today to knock out a few more pages in my the book I'm reading: The Last Tycoons. The work is basically an expose on the history of investment banking and one of the industry's most illustrious firms. Because I realized I really did not understand the various facets of the investment banking industry all that well, I thought I'd check it out. For anyone interested in reading the book, check out the first chapter, printed here in the NYTimes. I began reading this piece the day of my Contracts exam. While I knocked out around a hundred pages that first day, I've not had time to dig into the work again until today. Although it's seven hundred pages in length, I anticipate finishing the book before I leave for NYC on May 29. Because I will not have a television in my dorm in NYC, I would be open to any suggestions anyone might have on pieces I should read over the summer.

Well I suppose that's enough for the initial post. Brevity has never been one of my strongpoints. Cheers.