When Adam Brotman joined Starbucks, the company didn’t even have free Wi-Fi. A few years later, he helped architect one of the most powerful digital ecosystems in restaurant history: the Starbucks app, Rewards program, and Mobile Order & Pay system that changed how every brand thinks about loyalty.
In this episode of Restaurant Reset, Adam breaks down how it all happened and what every operator can learn from it.
We cover:
• How Starbucks built the “digital flywheel” connecting loyalty, mobile, and in-store ops
• The five-year journey from idea to mass adoption
• The operational chaos (and magic) behind Mobile Order & Pay• How to earn cross-functional trust across tech, ops, and baristas• The real value of guest data — and what happens when you don’t own it• Why AI will make loyalty more personal, not less• How operators can use ChatGPT to analyze data and optimize decisions• Why Adam believes AI is about to make hospitality more human
Adam also shares his playbook for evaluating new technology (from Web3 loyalty to AI-powered personalization) and the lessons he’s carried from Starbucks to J.Crew, Brightloom, and Forum3.
If you’ve ever wondered how digital transformation actually happens inside a restaurant brand, this is the episode to study.
Timestamps:
00:00 — Intro
01:30 — The moment Starbucks Rewards became a revenue engine
03:10 — Building the Starbucks “digital flywheel”
06:30 — Learning the business from ops before pitching innovation
11:40 — How long it really took to launch Mobile Order & Pay
16:50 — Balancing sexy tech with store-level practicality
24:00 — The unseen problems new tech creates
35:00 — Delivery apps and the cost of losing your data
43:00 — How operators should really use ChatGPT
45:00 — The next evolution of loyalty: personalization + community
50:00 — AI and the future of hospitality
53:00 — Adam’s top book recommendations