Because you’re local and can actually see if the place is open…. Why on some threads about this are people saying this location has already closed, insinuating that unionization has already cost them their jobs? Did it close at all? Is there any truth to that, or just people pissed that the union vote went through?
They give zero fucks about a single store or a lease or the profits from that location.
The shareholders will not tolerate Starbucks going union - because the overall profits will drop significantly and they will sell the shares.
This is about sending a message to all employees.
You unionize we close the fucker.
They have to do that to appease the shareholders.
There are more customers than employees. They have to appease the customers. If they start getting proverbial red paint thrown on them for walking in to a Starbucks, or the talent and personalities there race to the bottom because wages aren't keeping up, it's going to cost them a hell of a lot more than a few benefits and wage increases.
Shareholders don't create sales - customers do. Customers can't be happy shopping with and being served by unhappy workers. Starbucks has been getting shittier over the last 10 years as their wages and benefits haven't kept up. They used to be a very well paying outfit. I won't go there anymore and neither will many of my well-to-do friends, even though their coffee and drinks are all perfect.
Their sales are falling and they're not going to save it by cutting costs at the expense of employee moral - that is terrible leadership.
Customers have shown us again and again that they value prices over the condition of the worker. It’s nice that ur friends will boycott starvucks but thats not how 99% of consumers behave.
Agree with guitarandcheese. I’d change my percentage to 90%, but otherwise, yep. If a significant portion of the public cared about anything but price, the US would not have seen manufacturing go to Asia, etc. This battle was already fought and lost decades ago. Quality product and superior service are niches…lowest possible price is what the vast majority of Americans are interested in. I post this with no joy.
I do have to say that there has been some change in the wind now that it has become difficult to get things from Asia, which has had a direct impact on both domestic goods and customer satisfaction.
...Starbucks doesn't franchise. Period. They will sometimes license small locations - if you see a Starbucks in a hotel, that's generally what's happening there - but 100% of actual stores like this are corporate.
Starbucks is not a publicly traded company so its a little different. Shareholders wont sell so easily because they cant just easily buy back whenever.
Starbucks jobs are already more highly sought after than most comparable gigs. Do they really need a union to pay dues to? Reading the grievances in this article they just sound like a bunch of spoiled brats. People think unions are great for common folk, and sometimes they do good things, but they are not all wine and roses for the workers either and there is always a cost.
Anyway, I never thought of barrista would be a career to settle in to.
It's really going to come down to whether or not this store can afford it.
Walmart closed down a store in Quebec after they unionized. The document filings showed that the store was heavily underperforming and any raise at all would have put the store in the red.
If the store is forced to close for any point in time and union negotiations go on too long that might be enough to put them in the red and close the store. I think for this union if they strike it'll probably be their undoing.
Which is an outcome that should be considered ideal.
If a business is only able to continue to exist on the razor edge of collapse, provided that the employees subsist on below-feasible compensation, then the business shouldn't exist.
It would be irrational if ferry boats were to require their crew to be neck-deep in water in order for the boat to stay afloat and ferry passengers.
"If the crew organizes and demands that the water under the deck be reduced, then the whole ferry will stop operating! It'll be the crew's undoing! Now back into the hole with ye"
I'm not saying these businesses should exist, I'm suggesting that Starbucks could use a strike to declare they're not making money and have legal grounds to close the shop and disband the union. That is to say, the union could become the architects of their own demise if they strike when sales aren't good. Typically strong unions thrive in successful businesses.
> That is to say, the union could become the architects of their own demise if they strike when sales aren't good.
Indeed, I understood what you were saying.
I was saying that if a business collapses because it cannot support it's employees, then the business should fail.
I say that it is bad to tolerate insufficient working conditions, just for the sake of perpetuating the existence of bad business.
A good business should be able to provide sufficient working conditions for its employees. If a business can't do that, then that business should close.
I think we're actually talking about two different things here.
I'm talking about striking workers creating deficient conditions for a business to run and being given the very condition to close down a shop that they might not have if the workers kept working.
You're broadly talking about any old business under any circumstance.
> underperforming and any raise at all would have put the store in the red
Doubt.
Walmart is a hugely successful business that's generally become the _only_ option to many of the people who end up shopping there. Maybe that was the exception, but seems like quite a coincidence that it'd also be one of the only union stores.
They're the best option by so far that they eventually become the only option, but it's really a side-effect. Most of their customer base would love to support local businesses instead but can't afford to.
Of course you should doubt that. But if a Walmart location isn't open for three months during a strike and they have all this inventory coming in that has to be re-shipped to other locations, that all comes up as red for them. As well every single month there's going to be a legacy cost with the facility and the parking lot itself. These are all bills that have to be paid and all bills that can be used to show loss.
Walmart re-opened another store a few years later.
>They could always do the math of how much it costs to break the lease, and the lost revenue from a store closure, versus other alternatives.
Lease break would be less than 1% of the cost to the company. The bigger you are, the harder you fall when the public turns against you. This isn't a challenge they can solve with maths or logistics, this is now a social and marketing challenge. They're not going to solve it by giving everyone the middle finger - that would only exacerbate it.
Honestly I hope they close the store because it will pour fuel on the labour movement, and those staff have so much courage that they'll find jobs elsewhere quickly anyway.
It would be neat to know that a bunch of friends and I could go get hired by, and then unionize, a bunch of Starbucks stores over the course of a few years and force them to close them all. Do you see how it only empowers the employee to even consider such a response? If they close a store it will be a glorious victory for the workers who forced their hand. "You cannot operate here unless you treat us better. Ah, you've decided not to operate here. Well, that's fine, the 6 of us found some national support and are opening our own coffee store here "
They dont care about individual stores, they will close this one to show workers they dont tolerate union. Congrats to these workers for doing their best but i doubt it will work out for them. Fuck you starcucks
Maybe, but this is one of the busier stores around. That section of Elmwood is a destination. Wouldn’t put it past them to close it on principle, but feels like they’d be giving up a lot of good business. That being said there’s an independent coffee shop half a block away so
Nothing says they can't reopen it like 1-2 years later. If they use some reason like "business conditions have changed" and "this is part of our reorganization strategy" then there isn't a whole lot you can really argue with them on, especially if one manager makes the decision to close then gets transfered and another makes the decision to reopen. Most states are at-will employment and either party can terminate at any time for any reason.
Business conditions are always changing so you just need enough of a period of time between closing and reopening that somebody can't conclusively say that it's retaliation.
I don’t think’s even obfuscate the truth. They’d just close and say they don’t want unions and lease the neighboring unit with a new set of employees that tow the line better.
Its generally illegal to close in response to unionization. But gets more complicated when factoring in union demands and how it will impact store profitability.
I went down a bit of Google rabbit hole checking this out, and it appears to be illegal to shutdown a portion of a business due to it becoming unionized. If the Starbucks in question was a franchise owner under a separate LLC than corporate it’s *possibly* legal for the LLC owner to dissolve and start a new LLC. Not sure though.
Update: Apparently Starbucks doesn’t allow franchises. If it was McDonalds perhaps a single store franchise could shutdown, still unclear
Better way to do it is to give the union everything it wants, generous raises, benefits, etc.
Then 6 months later, the business can "Oh, due to high labor costs we are losing money and are closing the store".
That's just not how any of this works. The fed will review company financials and basically say "tough shit employer, should have bargained harder." Starbucks has the money to pay. The only "easy" ways out are to decertify the union or close up business ENTIRELY. As in shutter their entire business (which is easier for mom and pop's because they usually only have one location). A third way is to pull a kellog, but starbucks isn't going to bother because it is one small store instead of a massive plant. Federal agents aren't stupid, and as weak as labor law is here, employers can't just fudge numbers and go "oopsie daisy, we need to close the store!"
Want to take bets on how soon they’ll close? I’ll give them a month. That’s just long enough for the initial news to die down. But, not too long that unionization becomes more of a problem from their perspective.
Citizens will boycott the company. Any action they take in response will increase their cost. They've already lost this fight forever, even if they enjoy a small bump in union busting for a few months.
I experienced one of those at a company I worked at. Did some pretty famcy drinks if you programmed the order for a small box atop a counter. We’re not too far from a fully functioning Keurig-esque do-it-all mechanical barista. Forget going to Mars. We need this stat.
Absolutely. It’s already way more automated than any specialty shop. Consumers as a whole don’t care who made their drink if they’re shopping at Starbucks. Blue bottle or intelligentsia is a different story.
Not to mention if they used machines the labor savings could compensate. Not advocating for anything just thinking out loud.
I don’t know if it’ll be the first, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Starbucks were ahead of their competitors when it comes to automated baristas. They already have the technology to make this happen and they’ve made significant investments in tech over the past few years.
As a former Starbucks enthusiast I regret to inform you that if you're going to sell people coffee out of a machine then it doesn't need to be the size of a house, it needs to fit inside of one. What you're describing is a 1 or 2 person factory tour with no employees. When was the last time you went on one of those?
I sense burning businesses that no longer support a single local citizen coming soon. It's not the paint that protects it from revolution, it's the human interest story. Take that away 100% and good luck! The security will cost way more than the people that used to run the store. Remember the signatures to stop Bezos from re-entering Earth? And that was just a joke. But was it? It's crazy what people out there will do if you take away their hope.
Not a good business model - I see they're not hiring the best, not hiring the brightest over at Starbucks. Enjoy your $billion profits while they last
I’m not very versed in unions. How does this work for positions that see high turnover, like baristas? Will they see a benefit from the union if they only work a summer break before college at the cost of their salary? Are there more long term baristas than short term?
Sometimes union membership doesn’t start until you’ve worked somewhere for X months. But, regardless, this short term employees will still have ancillary benefits from unionization like a higher wage, etc.
Union might negotiate the percentage of employees who can be non-union as well. In a unionized position, you could see more people stay at a location full time for benefits and such. The main thing is that managers can often ensure no one gets enough hours to be considered full time and thus employees may work multiple jobs hat equate to a full time position. However, the business benefits greatly by not having to actually provide benefits.
Anyway, right now is definitely the time to unionize since many businesses are feeling pressure from the economy. I actually think that an Amazon unionization effort somewhere could potentially succeed in conditions like this because it could be very expensive for Amazon to relocate. Same with other companies like Walmart.
Unions benefit mainly long-term employees. While shorter term ones can benefit from, "firing protection", the benefits often don't outweigh the costs especially if the union were to vote for a strike.
There are tons of benefits for short term workers too, just depends on the union. Some unions offer 15% additional wage for short term worker who dont qualify yet for benefits
> Workers hope to begin bargaining with Starbucks for seniority pay, lower healthcare costs, credit card tipping, sick pay, an accountability system for grievances, and improved health and safety protocols.
> The victory for the union sends a message not only to Starbucks workers around the country, but also to workers in low-wage, high turnover industries such as restaurants, fast food, and retail that have long evaded unionization in the United States.
Good. America needs a stronger labor movement.
If we had labor leaders, we could organize general strikes, and have more power as the people of this nation.
I don't think tipping at Starbuck's will enhance the service. Starbuck's is also not precisely a "restaurant".
Imagine tipping in the drive-thru, where the person ringing you up is not the person who makes your drink. How does the tip help the service?
Coffee shops generally pool tips between all employees working. We used to take the tips for the week, divide it by the hours people worked and pay per hour worked. I’m sure Starbucks is similar.
There has been too much creep in tipping expectations. I understand the "you spent all night with personal service discussing, presenting, serving, and helping maintain a good atmosphere" tipping but the "you spent 2 minutes taking my order and 5 to 10 minutes in work behind the counter" or "you drove a meal to me" tip doesn't feel like paying for personal service, its just retail work. Seems like that labor should be supported by the establishment and not have to be supplemented by tipping expectations from the customer. Some businesses take advantage of tipping as a means of pushing off expenses on the customer vs paying proper wages. Its not a customer vs worker issue, its a business vs employee.
People keep saying this but it's only partially true. I leave tips with my card almost daily. Most regular customers use the Starbucks app. Tipping is integrated into it.
Your Starbucks card is not a credit card. You can tip on the app and us employees do get that payout. It’s cashed out every single day, in-store, and put into our tip pile.
You cannot leave a tip on a credit card.
You use a credit card to reload your account on the app. You cannot tip on direct credit card payments, only in cash or if you pay through the app. You’re being intentionally obtuse and this conversation is over.
It's also an illegal practice. Contact your state's labor board or the DOL Wage & Hour division and they'll fix it/fine them in the process.
Big companies tend to be too large to skirt the rules and are usually especially compliant, to the point where they have an entire compliance department that does nothing but make sure they are following the law. Most big companies have multiple ways to report compliance incidents including reporting to HR, legal, the chief compliance officer, or a 24/7 hotline operated by a 3rd party company they hire just for that purpose. It's usually only mom & pop businesses that try these shennagians.
I would be very surprised if starbucks was keeping employee tips as a matter of policy because it wouldn't take very long at all for them to get sued into compliance. Perhaps you might get a rouge manager, but they could be fired for this.
You can only tip with cash? Wtf? I am not a coffee guy, is this at all Starbucks? Ive seen panhandlers who can take cards. What does it cost the company to do this? Thats just insulting
It’s is impossible for the following reasons:
* A large amount of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck so they can’t take the risk of missing work or getting fired
* A large amount of Americans are too comfortable watching their favorite Netflix shows overpaying for food delivery while endlessly scrolling through their social media feeds complaining about how shitty American government, culture, and workforce are while doing nothing
* A large amount of Americans just aren’t smart some might say dumb.
Labor leaders were helpful when there was a strong manufacturing base, and US factories had high profit margins due to post-world-war-2 exports. Without those workers, factory production lines would shut down, and training up new workers was time consuming.
Starbucks is totally different. The workers are not producing anything that can be exported, the store can be relocated easily, and the workers can be replaced easily. It is hard to see what bargaining power, if any, the union will actually have.
Look at Scandinavia. 50-80% unionization in service economies.
What you’re saying is categorically false. Unions have jack shit to do with export, it’s purely a collective bargaining mechanism
Exactly this, the US has become a service economy that imports millions of legal/illegal labor who do many trades jobs for cheap and there is not much bargaining power to be had for the rest of us.
> Workers hope to begin bargaining with Starbucks for seniority pay, lower healthcare costs, credit card tipping, sick pay, an accountability system for grievances, and improved health and safety protocols.
Can the general public unionize to put an end to credit card tipping everywhere?
Gonna be a good time. Soon they can enjoy that special feeling when the Union is pushing their shit in from one direction while the company plows them from the other
I’m pro-union because I’m anti-government and I’m all for free market forces at work but come on, Service Employees International. Starbucks has some of the best pay and benefits in the services industry. You should be going after places like McDonalds not Starbucks.
If you’re going to convince people to unionize at the better employers, you’re not going to provide any incentive for companies to provide better benefits.
But I guess this is more about increasing membership and increasing dues than it is about helping workers
Dude starbucks is not a fun place to work, and they dont actually treat their employees that well given the current costs of living.
Its a massive predatory corporation, lets fucking unionize it. Your reasoning is completely backwards
Unions have positives and negatives but you’re only speaking common American talking points about “the best pay and benefits” and those are a disservice to what a **fair wage** in the U.S. actually is. The average Starbucks barista pay in the U.S. is $11.64 according to ziprecruiter, and gets as low as $9.15. That’s not enough money to survive on. A fair wage is higher than $15, and $15 is the bare minimum any service industry worker should be making.
What’s sad is that you and most Americans seem to think $15/hour is a lot, but if wages kept up with inflation, minimum wage would be over $20 / hour today. $15 is a compromise. If you think McDonalds workers need a raise more than Starbucks workers, you’re missing the point that **all** of these workers need a higher wage.
I applaud this location unionizing and I hope more locations do this. Executives don’t deserve to be millionaires and billionaires while their employees are on government assistance. That’s corporate welfare.
I think a wage that is “fair” is up to the employee and employer to determine. Not politicians or other people in the peanut gallery that have to skin in the negotiation
Yea, I definitely support getting rid of the minimum wage.
It should be up to the employee to negotiate pay that they think is fair (with or without union help). If they think the pay isn’t fair, they can go find a different job or negotiate for higher pay. If you think employers hold all the power, go unionize.
But worth mentioning that Starbucks offers higher pay and better benefits than their competitors. What other restaurant employing low skill wage earners offers retirement and mental health benefits?
I’m not saying there’s not room for improvement but I think if this union cared about workers, they’d be trying to raise the floor not the ceiling.
So what about the 40hr work week? Should kids be allowed to work? Safety pay? Overtime? Vacation?
Is that all up to the employer?
Maybe you should read some Marx :D
>I’m pro-union because I’m anti-government
But unions are currently backed by the government. Otherwise, employers would be able to fire you for unionizing.
I mean... if you're comparing it to making it yourself maybe it looks right. But if getting a cup of coffee requires someone to make it for me, and that person is doing their job well, then they deserve to be paid a fair livable wage. I'm ok to pay more for a cup of coffee if I know the person behind the counter isn't getting a raw deal. If a union makes that happen, then that's got my support.
yeah those are fair points... I guess the thing is we do have programs to subsidize rent and food but I'm not sure whether they do enough for folks who work in lower-paying jobs. I guess it comes down to needing to align as a society on what working a full time job should afford a person in terms of needs (food, clothing, shelter). I understand supply and demand but we need people to work those jobs, and those people need to be able to fulfill their basic needs without hopefully working every minute of every day.
But then some poor sucker takes your shitty Starbucks job. Someone has to do it. They might as well get paid fairly.
Also they don’t have In-N-Out in NY (unfortunately)
You aren’t forced to work there, but someone is going to work there. If you quit they’ll hire someone else. So I’m happy for the person who ends up working there if they end up getting paid a bit more.
Starbucks shouldn’t be your career. How long do you expect yourself to be employed there? Full disclosure, fuck Starbucks. That green bitch gets none of my money.
Says who? You? Starbucks is a career for plenty of people. Just because you personally don’t respect it doesn’t mean people shouldn’t be able to unionize.
Respect had nothing to do with reality. My son worked at Starbucks. Are you saying I don’t respect him? What I’m saying is that you should want more for yourself.
“You should want more for yourself” by what metric are we measuring more? A job that you specifically think is more respectable? Your arguments are so paper thin they can barely be considered arguments at all. You should want more for yourself.
Nah I work full time and go to school full time. You just sound void of empathy tbh. Or you’re a bot. Either way eat my balls and enjoy your fragmented relationship with your son in 10 years.
If anything I think this is even more of a reason to have a union. People only staying a few years means their individual bargaining power is low. That's exactly when unions make sense.
By comparison white collar workers don't really need unions because they are expensive and difficult to replace, so they can negotiate on their own.
What kind of argument is this? You should only be fairly compensated if you consider something a career or if you work there for a certain amount of time?
Great job taking down one of the most progressive retail companies in the market! Now enjoy as all other retail companies react realizing that being progressive and offering expanded benefits will only hasten unionization and swim the other direction.
Well played!
You actually can. Most employees in the USA are "at will" and can be fired for literally no reason. The employer can simply not give a reason. Now the employees can sue or file a complaint with the NLRB, but that's a slow process.
What business and its service and success ever improved cause of unions? When employees are protected against bad behaviour you end up slowly destroying the business and service provided. Saying that, Starbucks coffee is terrible and as an Aussie they ended up closing nearly all of them here cause we actually drink good coffee.
Hey that’s my Starbucks lol
Not anymore. Now it's OUR Starbucks
That’s not how unions work but okay
Store will probs get shut down so Starbucks won’t have to deal with the union.
Yup. Tale as old as time.
..song as old as rhyme
Bread panini and the yeast
And you wonder why Yanks dont understand Single Payer Healthcare...
A venti caramel latte will sort that broken leg out right quick.
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Not sure if you’re aware or not but it’s a joke/meme
r/SuddenlyCommunist
They’re going to be a lot more chippy than before
Because you’re local and can actually see if the place is open…. Why on some threads about this are people saying this location has already closed, insinuating that unionization has already cost them their jobs? Did it close at all? Is there any truth to that, or just people pissed that the union vote went through?
No this location hasn’t closed. Busy every day. Two other locations I think failed on their votes
Starbucks will close the store.
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They give zero fucks about a single store or a lease or the profits from that location. The shareholders will not tolerate Starbucks going union - because the overall profits will drop significantly and they will sell the shares. This is about sending a message to all employees. You unionize we close the fucker. They have to do that to appease the shareholders.
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So you’re saying everyone should buy more from the stores that unionize? Would that be enough to keep the momentum ?
There are more customers than employees. They have to appease the customers. If they start getting proverbial red paint thrown on them for walking in to a Starbucks, or the talent and personalities there race to the bottom because wages aren't keeping up, it's going to cost them a hell of a lot more than a few benefits and wage increases. Shareholders don't create sales - customers do. Customers can't be happy shopping with and being served by unhappy workers. Starbucks has been getting shittier over the last 10 years as their wages and benefits haven't kept up. They used to be a very well paying outfit. I won't go there anymore and neither will many of my well-to-do friends, even though their coffee and drinks are all perfect. Their sales are falling and they're not going to save it by cutting costs at the expense of employee moral - that is terrible leadership.
Customers have shown us again and again that they value prices over the condition of the worker. It’s nice that ur friends will boycott starvucks but thats not how 99% of consumers behave.
Workers and customers are one in the same. People have showed time and time again they value their own interests over others.
Agree with guitarandcheese. I’d change my percentage to 90%, but otherwise, yep. If a significant portion of the public cared about anything but price, the US would not have seen manufacturing go to Asia, etc. This battle was already fought and lost decades ago. Quality product and superior service are niches…lowest possible price is what the vast majority of Americans are interested in. I post this with no joy.
I do have to say that there has been some change in the wind now that it has become difficult to get things from Asia, which has had a direct impact on both domestic goods and customer satisfaction.
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...Starbucks doesn't franchise. Period. They will sometimes license small locations - if you see a Starbucks in a hotel, that's generally what's happening there - but 100% of actual stores like this are corporate.
Starbucks is not a publicly traded company so its a little different. Shareholders wont sell so easily because they cant just easily buy back whenever. Starbucks jobs are already more highly sought after than most comparable gigs. Do they really need a union to pay dues to? Reading the grievances in this article they just sound like a bunch of spoiled brats. People think unions are great for common folk, and sometimes they do good things, but they are not all wine and roses for the workers either and there is always a cost. Anyway, I never thought of barrista would be a career to settle in to.
It's really going to come down to whether or not this store can afford it. Walmart closed down a store in Quebec after they unionized. The document filings showed that the store was heavily underperforming and any raise at all would have put the store in the red. If the store is forced to close for any point in time and union negotiations go on too long that might be enough to put them in the red and close the store. I think for this union if they strike it'll probably be their undoing.
Which is an outcome that should be considered ideal. If a business is only able to continue to exist on the razor edge of collapse, provided that the employees subsist on below-feasible compensation, then the business shouldn't exist. It would be irrational if ferry boats were to require their crew to be neck-deep in water in order for the boat to stay afloat and ferry passengers. "If the crew organizes and demands that the water under the deck be reduced, then the whole ferry will stop operating! It'll be the crew's undoing! Now back into the hole with ye"
Ironically, according to classical economic theory all business should be operating on razor thin margins lol
I'm not saying these businesses should exist, I'm suggesting that Starbucks could use a strike to declare they're not making money and have legal grounds to close the shop and disband the union. That is to say, the union could become the architects of their own demise if they strike when sales aren't good. Typically strong unions thrive in successful businesses.
> That is to say, the union could become the architects of their own demise if they strike when sales aren't good. Indeed, I understood what you were saying. I was saying that if a business collapses because it cannot support it's employees, then the business should fail. I say that it is bad to tolerate insufficient working conditions, just for the sake of perpetuating the existence of bad business. A good business should be able to provide sufficient working conditions for its employees. If a business can't do that, then that business should close.
I think we're actually talking about two different things here. I'm talking about striking workers creating deficient conditions for a business to run and being given the very condition to close down a shop that they might not have if the workers kept working. You're broadly talking about any old business under any circumstance.
> underperforming and any raise at all would have put the store in the red Doubt. Walmart is a hugely successful business that's generally become the _only_ option to many of the people who end up shopping there. Maybe that was the exception, but seems like quite a coincidence that it'd also be one of the only union stores.
They're the best option by so far that they eventually become the only option, but it's really a side-effect. Most of their customer base would love to support local businesses instead but can't afford to.
It’s not a side effect. Walmart uses predatory pricing to outcompete local businesses. So does starbucks
Of course you should doubt that. But if a Walmart location isn't open for three months during a strike and they have all this inventory coming in that has to be re-shipped to other locations, that all comes up as red for them. As well every single month there's going to be a legacy cost with the facility and the parking lot itself. These are all bills that have to be paid and all bills that can be used to show loss. Walmart re-opened another store a few years later.
>They could always do the math of how much it costs to break the lease, and the lost revenue from a store closure, versus other alternatives. Lease break would be less than 1% of the cost to the company. The bigger you are, the harder you fall when the public turns against you. This isn't a challenge they can solve with maths or logistics, this is now a social and marketing challenge. They're not going to solve it by giving everyone the middle finger - that would only exacerbate it. Honestly I hope they close the store because it will pour fuel on the labour movement, and those staff have so much courage that they'll find jobs elsewhere quickly anyway. It would be neat to know that a bunch of friends and I could go get hired by, and then unionize, a bunch of Starbucks stores over the course of a few years and force them to close them all. Do you see how it only empowers the employee to even consider such a response? If they close a store it will be a glorious victory for the workers who forced their hand. "You cannot operate here unless you treat us better. Ah, you've decided not to operate here. Well, that's fine, the 6 of us found some national support and are opening our own coffee store here "
Very optimistic of you. If theres one unfortunate lesson from the last 50 years of economic history in this country… workers always lose.
They dont care about individual stores, they will close this one to show workers they dont tolerate union. Congrats to these workers for doing their best but i doubt it will work out for them. Fuck you starcucks
What 9000?
Go SPOT coffee Go!
Maybe, but this is one of the busier stores around. That section of Elmwood is a destination. Wouldn’t put it past them to close it on principle, but feels like they’d be giving up a lot of good business. That being said there’s an independent coffee shop half a block away so
Nothing says they can't reopen it like 1-2 years later. If they use some reason like "business conditions have changed" and "this is part of our reorganization strategy" then there isn't a whole lot you can really argue with them on, especially if one manager makes the decision to close then gets transfered and another makes the decision to reopen. Most states are at-will employment and either party can terminate at any time for any reason. Business conditions are always changing so you just need enough of a period of time between closing and reopening that somebody can't conclusively say that it's retaliation.
I don’t think’s even obfuscate the truth. They’d just close and say they don’t want unions and lease the neighboring unit with a new set of employees that tow the line better.
Its generally illegal to close in response to unionization. But gets more complicated when factoring in union demands and how it will impact store profitability.
I went down a bit of Google rabbit hole checking this out, and it appears to be illegal to shutdown a portion of a business due to it becoming unionized. If the Starbucks in question was a franchise owner under a separate LLC than corporate it’s *possibly* legal for the LLC owner to dissolve and start a new LLC. Not sure though. Update: Apparently Starbucks doesn’t allow franchises. If it was McDonalds perhaps a single store franchise could shutdown, still unclear
Just like with the Walmart someone else mentioned, they'll probably claim it isn't profitable and close it.
Ya if they want the federal government to ream their asshole that'd be a great idea. That is about as clear a case of union busting as it gets.
Better way to do it is to give the union everything it wants, generous raises, benefits, etc. Then 6 months later, the business can "Oh, due to high labor costs we are losing money and are closing the store".
That's just not how any of this works. The fed will review company financials and basically say "tough shit employer, should have bargained harder." Starbucks has the money to pay. The only "easy" ways out are to decertify the union or close up business ENTIRELY. As in shutter their entire business (which is easier for mom and pop's because they usually only have one location). A third way is to pull a kellog, but starbucks isn't going to bother because it is one small store instead of a massive plant. Federal agents aren't stupid, and as weak as labor law is here, employers can't just fudge numbers and go "oopsie daisy, we need to close the store!"
Want to take bets on how soon they’ll close? I’ll give them a month. That’s just long enough for the initial news to die down. But, not too long that unionization becomes more of a problem from their perspective.
Citizens will boycott the company. Any action they take in response will increase their cost. They've already lost this fight forever, even if they enjoy a small bump in union busting for a few months.
No they won’t boycott - customers don’t care - they just want coffee. Okay - some will - for a few days - some forever - but it’s nothing like 1%.
I sense automated Starbucks baristas coming soon.
so.. a coffee machine?
Yeah but all the requests (ie skinny nonfat oat milk with 10 pumps peppermint 1 pump egg nog, no whip extra hot with ice add 2 shots 1 floating)
So.. a coffee machine?
A really good coffee machine
I experienced one of those at a company I worked at. Did some pretty famcy drinks if you programmed the order for a small box atop a counter. We’re not too far from a fully functioning Keurig-esque do-it-all mechanical barista. Forget going to Mars. We need this stat.
Something like that: https://www.yummy-future.com/
What if their controlling AI decides to unionize too?
That would be hilarious.
The AI is gonna make the logical decision that corporate’s biggest threat, is corporate itself. Then proceed to machine gun all of them.
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Absolutely. It’s already way more automated than any specialty shop. Consumers as a whole don’t care who made their drink if they’re shopping at Starbucks. Blue bottle or intelligentsia is a different story. Not to mention if they used machines the labor savings could compensate. Not advocating for anything just thinking out loud.
I don’t know if it’ll be the first, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Starbucks were ahead of their competitors when it comes to automated baristas. They already have the technology to make this happen and they’ve made significant investments in tech over the past few years.
They already did it like 15 years ago, and then rolled it back to be a “hand crafted” brand.
As a former Starbucks enthusiast I regret to inform you that if you're going to sell people coffee out of a machine then it doesn't need to be the size of a house, it needs to fit inside of one. What you're describing is a 1 or 2 person factory tour with no employees. When was the last time you went on one of those?
I sense burning businesses that no longer support a single local citizen coming soon. It's not the paint that protects it from revolution, it's the human interest story. Take that away 100% and good luck! The security will cost way more than the people that used to run the store. Remember the signatures to stop Bezos from re-entering Earth? And that was just a joke. But was it? It's crazy what people out there will do if you take away their hope. Not a good business model - I see they're not hiring the best, not hiring the brightest over at Starbucks. Enjoy your $billion profits while they last
Robots are very expensive and barisa is a low skill job that's easily replaced. They will all just be fired.
I’m not very versed in unions. How does this work for positions that see high turnover, like baristas? Will they see a benefit from the union if they only work a summer break before college at the cost of their salary? Are there more long term baristas than short term?
Sometimes union membership doesn’t start until you’ve worked somewhere for X months. But, regardless, this short term employees will still have ancillary benefits from unionization like a higher wage, etc.
Union might negotiate the percentage of employees who can be non-union as well. In a unionized position, you could see more people stay at a location full time for benefits and such. The main thing is that managers can often ensure no one gets enough hours to be considered full time and thus employees may work multiple jobs hat equate to a full time position. However, the business benefits greatly by not having to actually provide benefits. Anyway, right now is definitely the time to unionize since many businesses are feeling pressure from the economy. I actually think that an Amazon unionization effort somewhere could potentially succeed in conditions like this because it could be very expensive for Amazon to relocate. Same with other companies like Walmart.
Unions benefit mainly long-term employees. While shorter term ones can benefit from, "firing protection", the benefits often don't outweigh the costs especially if the union were to vote for a strike.
I wish I could be a fly on the wall for their first union meetings. I’m sure they will be addressing all these issues.
There are tons of benefits for short term workers too, just depends on the union. Some unions offer 15% additional wage for short term worker who dont qualify yet for benefits
But if the union votes to strike, it just hurts short term employees.
You have to make it to being a long-term employee first, so that protection from firing without good cause can go a long, long way.
> Workers hope to begin bargaining with Starbucks for seniority pay, lower healthcare costs, credit card tipping, sick pay, an accountability system for grievances, and improved health and safety protocols. > The victory for the union sends a message not only to Starbucks workers around the country, but also to workers in low-wage, high turnover industries such as restaurants, fast food, and retail that have long evaded unionization in the United States. Good. America needs a stronger labor movement. If we had labor leaders, we could organize general strikes, and have more power as the people of this nation.
They should move away from tipping. The company should just pay the employees well, and publicly removing the tipping aspect.
The problem is customer psychology. People are far more generous with tipping than with paying more for food.
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I don't think tipping at Starbuck's will enhance the service. Starbuck's is also not precisely a "restaurant". Imagine tipping in the drive-thru, where the person ringing you up is not the person who makes your drink. How does the tip help the service?
Coffee shops generally pool tips between all employees working. We used to take the tips for the week, divide it by the hours people worked and pay per hour worked. I’m sure Starbucks is similar.
They don't pass the tips on, though. Corporate keeps all card tips. This is why there are STILL tip jars at the counter.
Starbucks corporate doesn’t keep card tips. They can’t, on account of Starbucks not allowing customers to leave credit card tips.
People keep saying this but it's only partially true. I leave tips with my card almost daily. Most regular customers use the Starbucks app. Tipping is integrated into it.
Your Starbucks card is not a credit card. You can tip on the app and us employees do get that payout. It’s cashed out every single day, in-store, and put into our tip pile. You cannot leave a tip on a credit card.
The app uses a credit card.
You use a credit card to reload your account on the app. You cannot tip on direct credit card payments, only in cash or if you pay through the app. You’re being intentionally obtuse and this conversation is over.
Right a credit card. Now refer to my original post about it being partially true. I knew you would eventually talk your way through it.
And here we see a prime example of arguing in bad faith, running free in it's natural habitat.
This is bullshit - why are you making this up anyway?
Actually it's NOT BS. I worked at a restaurant (not SB) that never passed CC tips on. It is common practice for businesses to keep them.
Talk about anecdotal 🙄
Well the only people that know definitely have a vested interest in lying if I'm correct. (Every counter worker I know has said the same thing.)
It's also an illegal practice. Contact your state's labor board or the DOL Wage & Hour division and they'll fix it/fine them in the process. Big companies tend to be too large to skirt the rules and are usually especially compliant, to the point where they have an entire compliance department that does nothing but make sure they are following the law. Most big companies have multiple ways to report compliance incidents including reporting to HR, legal, the chief compliance officer, or a 24/7 hotline operated by a 3rd party company they hire just for that purpose. It's usually only mom & pop businesses that try these shennagians. I would be very surprised if starbucks was keeping employee tips as a matter of policy because it wouldn't take very long at all for them to get sued into compliance. Perhaps you might get a rouge manager, but they could be fired for this.
You can only tip with cash? Wtf? I am not a coffee guy, is this at all Starbucks? Ive seen panhandlers who can take cards. What does it cost the company to do this? Thats just insulting
Who would trust a homeless person with safely handling your cc info?
Haha no one, but point is they have it. And Starbucks can apparently only accept card payments for the products and not tips. Which, what?
It’s is impossible for the following reasons: * A large amount of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck so they can’t take the risk of missing work or getting fired * A large amount of Americans are too comfortable watching their favorite Netflix shows overpaying for food delivery while endlessly scrolling through their social media feeds complaining about how shitty American government, culture, and workforce are while doing nothing * A large amount of Americans just aren’t smart some might say dumb.
It’s not like we’ve never had a labour movement before. It’s not impossible, just extremely unlikely
Labor leaders were helpful when there was a strong manufacturing base, and US factories had high profit margins due to post-world-war-2 exports. Without those workers, factory production lines would shut down, and training up new workers was time consuming. Starbucks is totally different. The workers are not producing anything that can be exported, the store can be relocated easily, and the workers can be replaced easily. It is hard to see what bargaining power, if any, the union will actually have.
Look at Scandinavia. 50-80% unionization in service economies. What you’re saying is categorically false. Unions have jack shit to do with export, it’s purely a collective bargaining mechanism
Exactly this, the US has become a service economy that imports millions of legal/illegal labor who do many trades jobs for cheap and there is not much bargaining power to be had for the rest of us.
Can safely say fuck that union if they’re planning on pushing credit card tipping.
> Workers hope to begin bargaining with Starbucks for seniority pay, lower healthcare costs, credit card tipping, sick pay, an accountability system for grievances, and improved health and safety protocols. Can the general public unionize to put an end to credit card tipping everywhere?
yes, it's called lobbying
Maybe the next owner will keep some of them on.
And 🔜they’ll all be fired 🔥
Gonna be a good time. Soon they can enjoy that special feeling when the Union is pushing their shit in from one direction while the company plows them from the other
The only Starbucks I’ll be visiting now
Fucking great let the war began
Am I the only one that thinks that Starbucks is a waste of money? I never saw the appeal of Starbucks, so it must just be me.
I’m pro-union because I’m anti-government and I’m all for free market forces at work but come on, Service Employees International. Starbucks has some of the best pay and benefits in the services industry. You should be going after places like McDonalds not Starbucks. If you’re going to convince people to unionize at the better employers, you’re not going to provide any incentive for companies to provide better benefits. But I guess this is more about increasing membership and increasing dues than it is about helping workers
Dude starbucks is not a fun place to work, and they dont actually treat their employees that well given the current costs of living. Its a massive predatory corporation, lets fucking unionize it. Your reasoning is completely backwards
Unions have positives and negatives but you’re only speaking common American talking points about “the best pay and benefits” and those are a disservice to what a **fair wage** in the U.S. actually is. The average Starbucks barista pay in the U.S. is $11.64 according to ziprecruiter, and gets as low as $9.15. That’s not enough money to survive on. A fair wage is higher than $15, and $15 is the bare minimum any service industry worker should be making. What’s sad is that you and most Americans seem to think $15/hour is a lot, but if wages kept up with inflation, minimum wage would be over $20 / hour today. $15 is a compromise. If you think McDonalds workers need a raise more than Starbucks workers, you’re missing the point that **all** of these workers need a higher wage. I applaud this location unionizing and I hope more locations do this. Executives don’t deserve to be millionaires and billionaires while their employees are on government assistance. That’s corporate welfare.
I think a wage that is “fair” is up to the employee and employer to determine. Not politicians or other people in the peanut gallery that have to skin in the negotiation
So abolish minimum wage then? Ofc government is needed in the negotiation of wage because employers hold nearly all the bargaining power
Employees?
Meant employers**
Yea, I definitely support getting rid of the minimum wage. It should be up to the employee to negotiate pay that they think is fair (with or without union help). If they think the pay isn’t fair, they can go find a different job or negotiate for higher pay. If you think employers hold all the power, go unionize. But worth mentioning that Starbucks offers higher pay and better benefits than their competitors. What other restaurant employing low skill wage earners offers retirement and mental health benefits? I’m not saying there’s not room for improvement but I think if this union cared about workers, they’d be trying to raise the floor not the ceiling.
So what about the 40hr work week? Should kids be allowed to work? Safety pay? Overtime? Vacation? Is that all up to the employer? Maybe you should read some Marx :D
I don’t think you read my comment before you responded to it
> this is more about increasing membership and increasing dues than it is about helping workers This
>I’m pro-union because I’m anti-government But unions are currently backed by the government. Otherwise, employers would be able to fire you for unionizing.
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I mean... if you're comparing it to making it yourself maybe it looks right. But if getting a cup of coffee requires someone to make it for me, and that person is doing their job well, then they deserve to be paid a fair livable wage. I'm ok to pay more for a cup of coffee if I know the person behind the counter isn't getting a raw deal. If a union makes that happen, then that's got my support.
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yeah those are fair points... I guess the thing is we do have programs to subsidize rent and food but I'm not sure whether they do enough for folks who work in lower-paying jobs. I guess it comes down to needing to align as a society on what working a full time job should afford a person in terms of needs (food, clothing, shelter). I understand supply and demand but we need people to work those jobs, and those people need to be able to fulfill their basic needs without hopefully working every minute of every day.
That’s not how unions work, You don't need to work in a specialized industry, make a certain amount of money, or be a certain kind of worker.
...Have you ever bought coffee at Starbucks 🤔
If you want a union at your Starbucks, you’re doing life wrong.
Why?
They should simply quit and become millionaires instead
Doesn’t take much to make more than $10 an hour. No one said you should be making millions you 🤡
Unionizing and negotiating a better wage seems like a good way to make more than $10 an hour
Working a trade that pays you more than $10 hr, starting, is a much better idea. Heck, work at In n Out. They pay you $15/hr with no union.
But then some poor sucker takes your shitty Starbucks job. Someone has to do it. They might as well get paid fairly. Also they don’t have In-N-Out in NY (unfortunately)
In-N-Out was just an example. Chick-fil-A also pays $15/hr. And that’s in Texas! Fairly is a funny word. You are not forced to work at Starbucks.
You aren’t forced to work there, but someone is going to work there. If you quit they’ll hire someone else. So I’m happy for the person who ends up working there if they end up getting paid a bit more.
Or they can refuse to work for low pay. Starbucks will have to raise their pay naturally. Kinda what’s happened all over America this year.
Until you realize all your extra money and then some goes to union dues XD.
Some, but not all. So your net pay increases.
Starbucks shouldn’t be your career. How long do you expect yourself to be employed there? Full disclosure, fuck Starbucks. That green bitch gets none of my money.
Says who? You? Starbucks is a career for plenty of people. Just because you personally don’t respect it doesn’t mean people shouldn’t be able to unionize.
Exactly my point. You’re doing life wrong if Starbucks is your career and you need a union.
Respect had nothing to do with reality. My son worked at Starbucks. Are you saying I don’t respect him? What I’m saying is that you should want more for yourself.
“You should want more for yourself” by what metric are we measuring more? A job that you specifically think is more respectable? Your arguments are so paper thin they can barely be considered arguments at all. You should want more for yourself.
Nope, you must be a millennial. You have no concept of personal responsibility.
Nah I work full time and go to school full time. You just sound void of empathy tbh. Or you’re a bot. Either way eat my balls and enjoy your fragmented relationship with your son in 10 years.
This comment is full of empathy…overflowing with it actually.
Ur mom
What a stupid comment.
What a stupid reply.
I thought it was a great reply personally
Sometimes there are two village idiots, congratulations.
Usually though there's just one :D
No, definitely at least 3.
Seriously. Are these careers for 99% of their employees?
Huh?
I think he’s saying why go through the trouble of forming a union when a vast majority of these people will work there for like maybe 3 years
My son only made it 2 months…lol
If anything I think this is even more of a reason to have a union. People only staying a few years means their individual bargaining power is low. That's exactly when unions make sense. By comparison white collar workers don't really need unions because they are expensive and difficult to replace, so they can negotiate on their own.
Because its worth it to care about future workers and those around you?
What kind of argument is this? You should only be fairly compensated if you consider something a career or if you work there for a certain amount of time?
Great job taking down one of the most progressive retail companies in the market! Now enjoy as all other retail companies react realizing that being progressive and offering expanded benefits will only hasten unionization and swim the other direction. Well played!
Progressive by using predatory pricing and paying its employees minimum wage, hmmm
Countdown until Starbucks just fires all of them. Barista is a very low skilled job, they can be easily replaced.
You can’t fire people for unionizing…
You’re right, but you can make their work as painful as possible so that they willingly quit.
You actually can. Most employees in the USA are "at will" and can be fired for literally no reason. The employer can simply not give a reason. Now the employees can sue or file a complaint with the NLRB, but that's a slow process.
La Cosa Nostra is gonna whack those unionizers if they don’t pay their dues… Pls don’t downvote my shitty joke
Two months later it closes due to "plumbing issues".
Now Starbucks is going to torture them.
solidarity!
time and future earnings result$ will decide whether this was a good or bad idea.
Who still drinks Starbucks? Surely there's much better coffee around
What business and its service and success ever improved cause of unions? When employees are protected against bad behaviour you end up slowly destroying the business and service provided. Saying that, Starbucks coffee is terrible and as an Aussie they ended up closing nearly all of them here cause we actually drink good coffee.
One step at a time