New Starbucks Legal Chief Reaps $3 Million After Mid-Year Hire

Starbucks Corp.’s new general counsel Bradley Lerman received about $3 million in total compensation after being hired midway through last year by the coffee chain.

Lerman, a former litigation partner at Kirkland & Ellis and Winston & Strawn, joined Starbucks in May 2023. He had previously retired in early 2022 after almost a decade as the top lawyer for medical products maker Medtronic PLC.

Starbucks detailed in a proxy statement filed Jan. 11 that Lerman received nearly $1.9 million in stock awards during 2023 and roughly $705,500 in cash, including roughly $331,700 in base salary. Starbucks also gave $363,700 to Lerman for “relocation assistance” as part of his move to the Seattle-based company, which appointed Laxman Narasimhan as its new chief executive officer last March.

Lerman currently owns more than $2.3 million in Starbucks stock, according to Bloomberg data. He most recently earned nearly $5.2 million during his final year at Medtronic, per a 2022 proxy statement filed by that Dublin-based company, which has its US headquarters in Minneapolis.

In its rationale for Lerman’s pay package, Starbucks said he led its law and corporate affairs department through a period of “transformational change in leadership and organizational structure,” including beginning the process of recruiting a new chief ethics and compliance officer. Lerman is also credited with helping the company’s board on a variety of “governance and investor issues.”

Starbucks, which has had considerable turnover in its legal group within the past two years, didn’t respond to a request for comment about any new additions. Lerman succeeded Zabrina Jenkins, who has switched to an executive advisory role at Starbucks after being tapped on an interim basis to replace former general counsel Rachel Gonzalez after she was ousted by the company in 2022.

Gonzalez received nearly $12 million in severance from Starbucks, which had hired her in 2018 to succeed Lucy Lee Helm as its law department leader. Gonzalez, who last year became the new legal head at General Electric Co. spin-off GE Vernova, wasn’t the only lawyer to leave the coffee retailer.

Starbucks also parted ways last year with its former ethics and compliance chief, Tyson Avery, as well as deputy general counsel and corporate secretary Jennifer Kraft, who left the company to take the top legal job at Foot Locker Inc. Shelly Ranus, a veteran in-house lawyer at Starbucks, was tapped to succeed Avery as acting ethics and compliance chief.

Bloomberg News reported last year on dozens of Starbucks white-collar workers and managers signing an open letter criticizing company policies, including a return-to-office mandate and alleged union-busting efforts against baristas and other retail employees in its stores. Starbucks continues to face labor battles.

Littler Mendelson had more than 100 lawyers handling labor-related matters for Starbucks across the US last year. Public records show that Starbucks also paid $150,000 through the first three quarters of 2023 to K&L Gates for the law firm to lobby the US government on a variety of issues, including company programs related to civic engagement and workforce employment, benefits, and training.

Starbucks, which has looked to bolster its in-house labor expertise, also faces competition from coffee industry upstarts. Scooter’s Coffee LLC, an Omaha-based drive-thru chain, named ex-Starbucks executive Joe Thornton its CEO as of Jan. 1. Scooter’s announced Friday its outside counsel, Susan Tegt of Minneapolis-based Larkin Hoffman Daly & Lindgren, would lead its legal team.