Starbucks union goes on strike in three cities

By Chris Isidore, Vanessa Yurkevich and Nathaniel Meyersohn, CNN

New York (CNN) — Members of Starbucks Workers United staged their first strike in 13 months Friday and plan an escalating strike between now and Christmas Eve in what would become the union’s largest work stoppage since the organizing campaign started at the coffee retailer three years ago.

The strike is due to start Friday in three cities — Starbucks’ hometown, Seattle, as well as Chicago and Los Angeles, which the union described as key markets for the company. It said the strike will spread to hundreds of stores from coast to coast by Christmas Eve unless the company makes a commitment to honor a framework to reach the first union contract at the company.

Starbucks Workers United won its first union election in Buffalo in December 2021 and has been organizing store-by-store across the company’s network since. It has won the right to represent 12,000 workers at 528 stores, according to the most recent count from the National Labor Relations Board, which oversees representation elections in the private sector. The union has also lost votes at 100 stores. But in either case, that is still just a fraction of the company’s 11,200 company-operated stores in the United States, employing about 201,000 workers as of the end of September.

The fight for the first contract

The union held a series of strikes at a selection of its represented stores since its first strike at about 100 locations in November 2022. In the past, many of the stores on strike remained open, as the company replaced the unionized striking workers with managers and workers from nearby non-union stores. A person familiar with the impact of the strikes told CNN only 10 stores in total, spread among the three cities, did not open as normal on Friday.

“There has been no significant impact to our store operations,” said Phil Gee, a spokesperson for Starbucks. “We are aware of disruption at a small handful of stores, but the overwhelming majority of our US stores remain open and serving customers as normal.”

But with the company and union holding negotiations and reporting progress throughout much of this year, this is the first major strike called by the union since November 2023.

Whenever the union has waged a strike against Starbucks it has been for a set duration of time, rather than the kind of open-ended strike waged recently at Boeing, the Big Three automakers or Hollywood studios, in which union members stay on the picket line until an agreement is reached. Shorter, set-duration strikes have grown in popularity with US unions in recent years, with occasionally great success, like the 2023 strike at healthcare giant Kaiser Permanente.

The union said it had a framework in place with Starbucks management since February, on which to reach its first labor agreement as well as to resolve outstanding legal complaints. But it said management has not lived up to that agreement.

“Nobody wants to strike. It’s a last resort, but Starbucks has broken its promise to thousands of baristas and left us with no choice,” said Fatemeh Alhadjaboodi, a five-year Starbucks barista from Texas and bargaining delegate, in a statement released by the union. “In a year when Starbucks invested so many millions in top executive talent, it has failed to present the baristas who make its company run with a viable economic proposal. This is just the beginning. We will do whatever it takes to get the company to honor the commitment it made to us in February.”

The company insists that it is committed to reaching a deal and is willing to return to the table. It said the union is the one that has cut off negotiations.

“It is disappointing they didn’t return to the table given the progress we’ve made to date. Since April we’ve held more than nine bargaining sessions over 20 days,” said the Starbucks statement. “We’ve reached over thirty meaningful agreements on hundreds of topics Workers United delegates told us were important to them, including many economic issues.”

Starbucks said it can’t afford to meet the union’s demand, saying its “proposals call for an immediate increase in the minimum wage of hourly partners by 64%, and by 77% over the life of a three-year year contract. This is not sustainable.”

The union denies that is the amount of money it sought in various economic proposals it put forward, saying it mischaracterizes and combines various separate demands. But it declined to give details about what it is seeking.

The company said it pays an average of more than $18 an hour and provides what it describes as best-in-class benefits, including health care, free college tuition, paid family leave and company stock grants.

“No other retailer offers this kind of comprehensive pay and benefits package,” said the company.

But the union claims that Starbucks management has backtracked on early progress since September, which is when Brian Niccol became its new chief executive officer.

“In October, November, and December, Starbucks failed to bring viable economic proposals to the table that included real investment in baristas,” said Michelle Eisen, a 14-year Buffalo Starbucks barista who was one of the leaders of the first organizing effort in that city, in a union statement. “This is backtracking on months and months of progress and promises from the company to work toward an end-of-year framework ratification. We’re ready to do what it takes to show the company the consequences of not keeping their promises to baristas.”

The union pointed to the company’s executive compensation, especially the package given to new CEO Brian Niccol, as a sign that the company could do more. Niccol, who came to Starbucks in September, received a grant of 332,000 shares of Starbucks stock which will vest over the course of the next three years as part of his contract. Those shares are worth $29.5 million as of Thursday’s close.

This story has been updated with additional reporting and context.

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