How Starbucks Saved My Life

Sunday Morning: A Riches-To-Rags Story Takes A Fortuitous Turn At A Coffee Shop

NEW YORK, Dec. 23, 2007

Michael Gates Gill was an Ivy League graduate and a successful ad agency executive with a six-figure salary. But downsizing, divorce and health problems sent his life spiraling downwards — until he happened upon a coffee shop that was hiring. (CBS)

 

(CBS) Millions of us wake up every morning to a good strong cup of coffee. And, as it happens, coffee figures in the story of the wake-up call one man received after hitting a low point reminiscent of George Bailey's in the film "It's a Wonderful Life." Anthony Mason tells the tale:

By his own admission, Michael Gill was a child of privilege.

"I was born with just about every advantage you could imagine, or even wish for," he told Mason.

He went to an Ivy League college, was a top executive at a world renowned ad agency, and had a six-figure salary. But now at age 67, he's trudging through the dark just before 5 o'clock in the morning, to make the early shift for his new job.

He's a barista at Starbucks. (...)

"It was desperation or courage, but I think

 I just realized this is the moment I can't

afford to miss."

(...)He was 53 when a fellow executive invited him out to breakfast:

"And she said, you know, those classic words: 'Michael, we have to - we have to let you go.'"

"How did you feel at that moment?" Mason asked.

"I felt stunned. To be 53 and fired in advertising is really a death notice." (...)

(...)So amazing that Tom Hanks has bought movie rights, and reportedly wants to play Michael in the film.

"I was in a state of shock, because I'd written a very different ending for my life," Gill said. "I'd written sort of an unhappy life going from riches to rags, and here was Tom Hanks calling and saying he wanted to play me in a movie."(...)

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