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Jack Dorsey cut a deal with Starbucks that's lost $100k every day for three years -- and gave up equity and a board seat for the privilege.

• blackguardx 11y ago
  Yeah, but it came with a bunch of free advertising at the time. Square also thought Starbucks would help Square launch new customer-facing products because of Howard Schultz's board seat, but that never materialized. I think it was a good deal at first, but definitely wasn't worth it over the long haul. Square was betting that Starbucks would help them in exchange for subsidizing their payment processing, but Starbucks pretty much just stuck to the contract they signed.
  • tacos 11y ago
    You can buy a lot of advertising for $100k a day. More importantly, you can stop buying that advertising when the product doesn't catch on. Dorsey pulled the product in 2014 and is still paying close to a Super Bowl spot every month to advertise it.
    • blackguardx 11y ago
      I don't think anyone at Square thought it was a good deal for the last two years.
  • ng12 11y ago
    > Square also thought Starbucks would help Square launch new customer-facing products It was obvious that this was never going to happen from the beginning. Square neutered Wallet for the Starbucks deal, turning it into a less compelling implementation of the existing QR-code system.