Starbucks Corp.’s new general counsel, Bradley Lerman, landed approximately $3 million in total recompense after being employed by the coffee giant midway through the prior year. Before joining Starbucks in May 2023, Lerman, a former litigating partner at Kirkland & Ellis and Winston & Strawn, had announced his retirement in 2022, following his stint of nearly a decade as Medtronic PLC’s top legal officer.
According to a Starbucks proxy statement filed Jan. 11, Lerman received nearly $1.9 million in stock awards during 2023 and approximately $705,500 in cash, complemented by roughly $331,700 as base salary. The Seattle-based company also contributed $363,700 to Lerman for “relocation assistance”. Additionally, the records revealed that Lerman is currently in possession of more than $2.3 million worth of Starbucks stock.
Starbucks justified Lerman’s package citing his role in steering its law and corporate affairs department through “transformational turns in leadership and organizational structure.” He was seminal in the recruitment process of a new Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer, besides addressing myriad “governance and investor issues.”
Paralleling the timeframe of Lerman’s enlistment, Starbucks underwent substantial turnover within its legal group. Lerman succeeded Zabrina Jenkins, who had assumed a temporary responsibility following the expulsion of former general counsel Rachel Gonzalez in 2022, and latterly moved to an executive advisory role.
Several others left the company’s legal team last year, including its former ethics and compliance chief, Tyson Avery, and Jennifer Kraft, ex-deputy general counsel and corporate secretary, who moved to Foot Locker Inc. Shelly Ranus, a Starbucks veteran, replaced Avery as acting ethics and compliance chief.
In 2023, Starbucks confronted labor-related disputes handled by more than 100 Littler Mendelson lawyers across the US. Starbucks also paid $150,000 to K&L Gates to lobby the US government on various issues in the first three quarters of the same year.
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