Sublime

Savvy Fastlane entrepreneurs recognize that a thriving local business with weak leverage can be made highly leveraged by franchises or chains. Does this path sound familiar? It should; this is what Starbucks did to become the biggest coffee chain globally.

A timber magnate in Seattle named William E. Boeing, bidding low because he built his own airplanes, won the line from Chicago to San Francisco, giving birth to what would become United Airlines.

All this happened because Eric and Adam had an idea, a story to tell, and, eventually, a product to sell. From their very first sale, they led with their story—the personal story of two guys worried about the toxicity of the products they cleaned with, and the professional story of a company that approached cleaning in an environmentally friendly

Afterward, Alberg and Bezos told the Riggios they would think about a partnership. Later Alberg and Bezos spoke on the phone and agreed that such a collaboration was unlikely to work. “Jeff was always a big believer that disruptive small companies could triumph,” Alberg says. “It wasn’t the end of the world. We knew we had a challenge.”

For us, that means doing our best to treat everyone with respect and dignity, from coffee farmers and baristas to customers and neighbors. I understand that striving to achieve profitability without sacrificing humanity sounds lofty. But I have always refused to abandon that purpose—even when Starbucks and I lost our way.

The cultural fit had to be just right, too. It was this issue that the partners would spend the most time agonizing over. The five Benchmark partners felt keenly the closeness of a basketball team; in moments of private vanity they liked to think of themselves as the Chicago Bulls in the early nineties, but it wasn’t apt—this was a team that was