Time to Get Tough: How Cookies, Coffee, and a Crash Led to Success in Business and Life

Michael Joseph Coles, Catherine M. Lewis

University of Georgia Press, 2018 - Biography & Autobiography - 216 pages

Michael J. Coles, the cofounder of the Great American Cookie Company and the former CEO of Caribou Coffee, did not follow a conventional path into business. He does not have an Ivy League pedigree or an MBA from a top-ten business school. He grew up poor, starting work at the age of thirteen. He had many false starts and painful defeats, but Coles has a habit of defying expectations. His life and career have been about turning obstacles into opportunities, tragedies into triumphs, and poverty into philanthropy.

In Time to Get Tough, Coles explains how he started a $100-million company with only $8,000, overcame a near-fatal motorcycle accident, ran for the U.S. Congress, and set three transcontinental cycling world records. His story also offers a firsthand perspective on the business, political, and philanthropic climate in the last quarter of the twentieth century and serves as an important case study for anyone interested in overcoming a seemingly insurmountable challenge. Readers will also discover practical leadership lessons and unconventional ways of approaching business.

What people are saying

Time to Get Tough: How Cookies, Coffee, and a Crash Led to Success in Business and Life

User Review  - Publishers Weekly

Coles, cofounder of Great American Cookies and former executive at Caribou Coffee, shares life lessons learned the hard way in this winning chronicle. He begins by movingly recounting how, as a young ...

Contents

• Step into the Valley: 1
• 1 In the Shadow of Goliath: 7
• 2 Hey Kid Do You Want a Job?: 16
• 3 Its All Sold: 26
• 4 What Strike?: 37
• 5 Do You Know How Many Cookies?: 53
• 6 From Cookie to Counter: 64
• 7 The Crash: 73
• 8 Inch by Inch: 83
• 9 Exit 666: 96
• 10 TTGT: 105
• 11 The Reckoning: 114
• 12 That Was Pretty Fast: 129
• 13 Building a Brand Religion: 139
• 14 Fifty Percent to Go: 151
• 15 This Is the Battlefield: 157
• 16 Service Service Service: 170
• 17 Love Spoken Here: 181
• 18 The Last Five Miles: 187
• The First Law of Nature Is Growth: 202
• Acknowledgments: 209
• About the Authors: 215

About the author

Michael J. Coles is an Atlanta business executive, serial entrepreneur, education advocate, and well-known public speaker. He is the founder of the Great American Cookie Company and the former CEO of Caribou Coffee Company, as well as former chair of the Georgia Film Commission.

Catherine M. Lewis is Assistant Vice President of Museums, Archives & Rare Books; Director of the Museum of History and Holocaust Education; and Professor of History at Kennesaw State University. Dr. Lewis is the author, co-editor, or co-author of 14 books, including, most recently, Memories of the Mansion: The Story of the Georgia Governor's Mansion (with Sandra Deal and Dr. Jennifer Dickey), published by the University of Georgia Press.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Time to Get Tough: How Cookies, Coffee, and a Crash Led to Success in Business and Life
• Authors: Michael Joseph Coles, Catherine M. Lewis
• Contributor: Jim Kennedy
• Edition: illustrated
• Publisher: University of Georgia Press, 2018
• ISBN: 0820354627, 9780820354620
• Length: 216 pages
• Subjects: Biography & Autobiography / Business