Starbucks Hires A CBO: In Unrelated News, I Don't Know What A CBO Is

Jack Westerkamp, Co-Founder

As a self-appointed champion for Starbucks, it is my duty to be fully informed on all things Starbeezy’s. If you saw, I recently announced my openness for consideration to be on WPP’s “Team Starbucks” Creative Team.

Starbucks just hired Tressie Lieberman to step in as Chief Brand Officer of Starbucks, which is a newly formed position at the firm, and a relatively new title in the business world. 

Starbucks also just hired a new CEO by the name of Brian Niccol a few months ago, and it appears he’s putting an emphasis on bringing the brand recognition back to Starbucks. Or I’m assuming that’s something a Chief Brand Officer would do? I don’t know yet.

My goal for this blog is to get myself to be knowledgeable enough to have at least one “go to phrase” that illustrates I know what a Chief Brand Officer is, if it were to come up at a party. 

Because everyone knows there’s nothing more common than CBO (that stands for “Chief Brand Officer”, FYI) talk at your standard cocktail party. And that means I need to be ready. Which means you need to be ready, too. Let’s get ready.

A few weeks ago, I looked across the table to Geno in our Content Cave and asked “What is a Chief Brand Officer?”

At that point, Geno said something. The reason I do not have a quote here is because I actually forgot what he said. As a result, this blog is born.

Is this not just a Chief Marketing Officer?

Be honest, you thought the same thing. 

I did some research for us all, and I found out a few things in about 50x the time it would have taken Chat GPT. But can Chat GPT weave in objectively hilarious banter while giving key takeaways? Yes, actually.

So, per an Adweek article I read, it sounds like the CMO (that stands for “Chief Marketing Officer”, FYI) has transformed into more of a data focused operator over the last decade or so. And by data focused operator, I think that just means that they have to make a ton of data-informed decisions on how they spend money on advertising and marketing the business for the singular focus of increasing sales and profit margin blah blah blah, while not having as much time to worry about the creative flair and brand-building exercises. 

The CMO role feels more financial and P&L driven than a Chief Brand Officer would be. 

So, to boil it down. At a huge company like Starbucks, the Chief Marketing Officer job (or whatever their equivalent is) seems like the business side of the creativity that would be sourced from the Chief Brand Officer’s vision. Or something like that.

And I think it’s important to remind ourselves that not every CMO is doing the same thing, nor would every company need a full on Chief Brand Officer position. But when your brand is so crucial to separating yourself in an industry like COFFEE, it seems warranted to put some more muscle behind it.

You nailed that one, Jack. Can we move on to talking about Chief Brand Officers now?

Yeah. So, let’s stick with Starbucks. I did some investigative research on Tressie Lieberman (Linkedin’d her. I sent her a connection request. No response… YET.), and her background is equal parts impressive as it is telling on what the Chief Brand Officer role might entail.

Tressie has spent the majority of her career in senior marketing positions at food brands like Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, and most namely, Chipotle. If you did not know, Chipotle is where Starbucks’ new CEO, Brian Niccol, previously was the CEO.

And most recently, Tressie was CMO of Yahoo!

So, what does this tell me? It sounds like the Chief Brand Officer has to have a knowledge of the marketing and business side of things, at least at Starbucks, but also must be able to identify and push forward the vision of the brand. I think time will tell as to what that actually means for Starbucks. And it really could mean just driving home what we already know about Starbeezy’s. The Chief Brand Officer is in charge of the narrative, and in charge of constructing the narrative around how people talk about Starbucks.

Because right now, at least in the East Village, I get made fun of constantly for getting Starbucks and not hitting up a local coffee shop. People call me “cheugy”. So, will Starbucks turn that brand narrative around so I can stop having to defend my coffee choices to people signicantly cooler than me? Time will tell!

Ok, side bar. I can’t help but think about how University of Texas named Matthew McConaughey the “Minister of Culture”. Still one of the greatest things I’ve ever seen.

Alright back to business.

I do think the Chief Brand Officer has already been established as a “must have” for large, consumer-facing organizations. CEO Brian Niccol has been at Starbucks for a cup of coffee (pun intended) and has already created the new position. Clearly, it matters. And execs are thinking about it. 

In the era of AI and as more and more brands are being “disruptive” and “edgy”, it is so imperative to have a clear brand and story so you can separate yourself from the crowd. And now, I will be revealing my cocktail party phrase if/when I am ever invited to one of those:

“Yeah the Chief Brand Officer is all about constructing the public perception of the company. For example, getting people to not think I’m cheugy for getting Starbucks.”

- Jack