Starbucks Introduces Tech To Its Coffee

Howard Schultz, founder, president, chairman and CEO of

wants to

in the tech space, specifically dabbling in mobile payments. Schultz went over the coffee maker's plans on Wednesday with CNBC's Jim Cramer. “We have been and we will always be a coffee company, but the question that any consumer brand must answer today is ‘How do you become relevant?' Not only inside the four walls of your stores, but on digital, mobile, loyalty and card,” said Schultz. “We have a big lead, and that lead has given us permission to play outside of our stores. We're going to be in the coffee business; we're going to be in the tea business; we're going to be in the consumer experience business; and potentially, we're going to be in the mobile payment business.”

The plan is partly marketing strategy and partly based on customers' convenience. “I think we saw early on that we were going to see a seismic change in consumer behavior and that played itself out in the last quarter. In anticipation of that, we realized that we had to be as relevant with the consumer…outside of our stores,” said Schultz. “The mobile-payment platform has given us higher degree of frequency; higher degree of loyalty; and the question is ‘How can we leverage that beyond the four walls of our stores?'”