Scott Bedbury Profile
Scott Bedbury is recognized as one of the world's top business minds for helping build some of the most respected brands today, including Nike, Starbucks and Airbnb.
Scott has spoken in more than 30 countries on best practices that have defined a dozen iconic brands he has worked with. In 2002 he published A New Brand World (Viking Press).
Scott joined Nike in 1987 to help reposition a struggling niche athletic brand, in third place behind Reebok and adidas. Important to shifting Nike toward the more inspirational brand we see today was the launch of the "Just Do It" campaign Scott directed in 1988. In the seven years that followed, Nike established one of the most creative and unified global brand campaigns in business history.
In 1995 Scott joined Starbucks, then one-tenth the size of Nike, to help Howard Schultz expand the four hundred store coffee house chain in 14 US cities. As Chief Marketing Officer, he helped transform one of the world's oldest commodities into a warm and welcome "third place" between home and work for millions every day, establishing an experiential marketing case study now studied around the world.
In three years, Starbucks increased store openings from one per week to three per day. Currently, Starbucks operates more than 22,000 stores in nearly 50 countries serving more than 25 million customers a day, adhering to the core brand positioning created in the mid 90's.
In 1998, Scott left Starbucks to write and establish Brandstream, his consulting firm. Since then he has advised leaders of Airbnb, Apple, Facebook, Google, P&G, Coca-Cola, NASA, Samsung, Casper Sleep, Ferrero, Microsoft, Starwood Hotels, Tellme Networks, Russian Standard, the US Navy, The North Face, Corona, and VWAG.
From 2011 to 2013 Scott served as a strategic advisor to Brian Chesky, Co-Founder and CEO of Airbnb, helping guide what has become one of the most valuable and fastest growing private brands in the world.
In 2015 Scott became Co-Founder and Chairman of Upstream Research, a disruptive health analytics company focused on global disease prevention. Upstream has roots in Missoula, Montana and is now based in Winslow, Washington.