Stepping up their pressure against Starbucks, a multinational company currently worth $113 billion, workers at 113 of its U.S. outlets went on strike March 22. In Seattle, the company was finally forced to the bargaining table in earnest with some workers, a major step forward, according to representatives of Starbucks Workers United (SBWU).
The strikes were organized by SBWU, a barista network attached to Workers United, an affiliate in turn of SEIU, one of the biggest unions in the country. But the barista movement’s young, diverse, LGBTQ+-heavy workforce and their momentum have lent it a vibrancy that established unions have struggled to achieve in recent decades.
At a Starbucks in southern Long Island, a racially mixed group of baristas gathered on the sidewalk near busy Sunrise Highway during the March 22 strike and beseeched drivers to “Turn around! Turn around!” from the drive-through. Every so often, a car would reverse, and cheers would go up from the workers and their supporters. Most customers, however, crossed the picket line.
In between chants like “Union workers on strike! Dunkin Donuts up the street!,” several baristas and supporters talked to The Progressive about the walk out. They told stories of mice, mold, and maggots in the store, and how they had to work shifts with half as many coworkers as they needed. They also mentioned puddles of mystery fluids on the store’s floor, a lack of gloves for cleaning bathrooms, and casual racism from managers, all of which drove them toward the union.
Many of the issues they highlighted revolved around a lack of dignity and basic human respect at the workplace—which stands in contrast to the friendly image that Starbucks uses to attract workers, going so far as to call them “partners.” Barista Bambi Espinoza tells The Progressive that they’ve been told they’re close to being fired for having four facial piercings.
Espinoza is required to wear a mask when they work—not for COVID-related reasons, they say, but to cover three of their piercings. “Having more than one facial piercing was never gonna change my quality of work. You can ask some customers: I love them. I want them to come in and feel happy every day,” Espinoza says.
“It’s just so ridiculous that because of Starbucks, I…feel like I have to hide the person I am, hide myself, when I have done nothing but just try to make everybody’s lives better,” they added.
Increasingly, baristas are seeing a glimpse of what it looks like to win. The strikes, which were in the works for about six weeks, appear to have been more effective than past strikes by SBWU. Six of seven stores striking in Illinois were shut down, according to Peoria-based barista Jen Lenz, who was supporting regional activities in the Chicagoland area.
“A lot of these stores have built up a credible threat so much that…those store managers just don’t want to deal with it,” she says, noting that the stores closed down partly because management wouldn't have been able to operate them without relying on these workers. Similarly, Lydia Fernandez, a barista based in Philadelphia, notes that four of six striking stores in that city were successfully shut down.
At only about a year-and-a-half old—and even with support from its established union parent Workers United—Starbucks Workers United appeared to face a steep uphill battle as recently as six months ago. The company had managed to staunch an exponentially increasing rate of union filings, and embarked on an “egregious and widespread” series of labor law violations.
Most notably, Starbucks has refused to bargain in good faith with unionized stores, a legal requirement under the National Labor Relations Act. Experts say bargaining for a first contract is often even more difficult than winning a union election in the United States. Though the first unions were won in December 2021, not a single unionized company-run Starbucks has a contract.
Since last autumn, though, the nascent barista organizing network has increased its capacity to exert pressure on the $113 billion company. Prior to that point, the two strategies primarily used by the movement were frequent but uncoordinated strikes at the store level and the filing of Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) charges with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB)—both of which proved ineffective at forcing Starbucks to the table.
Beginning in early August of last year, SBWU’s stores in Massachusetts held their first regionally coordinated strikes. This was a precursor to nationally coordinated strikes that happened in November and December. Meanwhile, the slow, winding course of ULP charges made their way up the chain at the NLRB and, at times, to federal court. While baristas haven’t won every decision, they’ve won enough to provide ammunition for a well-founded public relations campaign that rests on the authority of the federal government’s words and not just baristas.
New filings, which had nearly come to a halt last summer, have begun to pick up again—the campaign announced seven new store filings on Wednesday—and former CEO Howard Schultz is going to be hauled in front of a Senate committee chaired by Senator Bernie Sanders, Independent of Vermont, to testify under oath next week. So while the baristas are not out of the woods yet, they’re inching closer to achieving those elusive first contracts.
“This [strike] is to try to push them to bargain in good faith,” Liv Ryan, a shift supervisor at the Long Island store and a member of SBWU’s national bargaining committee, says. “And if it doesn’t convince the board of directors, then we’re hoping that it’ll at least scare stockholders.”