My family thinks I want a jet

Keith Ferrazzi

When I was at Starwood, I shared a corporate jet with a group of folks. And when I worked for Mike Milken, I traveled a lot with him on his jet. I always enjoyed it as a nice perk, but I couldn’t help but think how silly some people were to say things like “I need my jet.”

But with the recent changes in security and a little bad luck, traveling has been ridiculous. So ridiculous that a private jet is sounding really good right now.

Couple weeks ago everything worked perfectly. Flew to Atlanta for dinner one night. The next morning at 5am I was on my way to Phoenix to give a speech. On to New York that evening to prepare to give a breakfast talk in Princeton, New Jersey, the next morning. Then took a car down to Philadelphia to give a talk and flew home for dinner that evening. That was three days, five cities. Everything worked perfectly. Even when I was leaving luggage inside security so I could get in and out quickly. No problems.

The next trip was quite different. Left San Antonio for State College, PA. I was scheduled to arrive in Pittsburgh at 11pm and then take a car to State College and arrive around 2am. Well, delays put me in Pittsburgh at 2am. Arrived in State College at 5am.

Hung out there for a couple hours, gave my talk over lunch. Then I was off to Chicago. After the two hour drive to Harrisburg’s airport, my flight was delayed. Then there was a problem during the flight that caused us to simply fly around to dump fuel so we could land safely – back in Harrisburg, at 9pm. The next flight, if we were lucky, they said, would leave around midnight. 

Since I had a lunch speaking engagement, I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast at 7am after my 2 hours of “sleep.” I was starving. Security was closed so we couldn’t leave. No concessions were open. But there was a Starbucks there and all of their stuff was still out and accessible.

So after a minute of staring at the cookies, sandwiches, water, and more, I picked up a water and a cookie and left $10. I thought that was perfectly reasonable.

As I was walking away, a gentleman came out from the back and said, “Excuse me, sir, you have to come back here. That’s stealing.”

“Oh, no worries. I left you ten dollars for probably four dollars worth of stuff.”

“No you don’t understand. The cash register is closed.”

“Well, do you mind if I just leave the money here and ring it up tomorrow morning or just take note of it? I haven’t had anything since breakfast.”

“No, it’s not our issue. Protocol would suggest that if you’re delayed and there’s a problem that you should go to American Airlines to feed you.”

“You’re Starbucks. You’ve got the food here. What’s the big deal?”

“Well, I’m the only one here.”

“That’s okay. I don’t need anyone else here. I only need you here.”

“You know what, sir. I’m going to call the police. In addition, when I do leave, I’m going to make sure the cameras are on here so you won’t be able to take anything.”

I couldn’t help but laugh, thinking that I couldn’t wait to tell this story to my friends at Starbucks, including one of the early founders, who’s a good friend, Arthur Rubinfeld.

Protocol suggests... Well, Starbucks protocol sent me away hungry. And the thought of a private jet tasted better than ever.