Workers at two Starbucks stores in Arizona will be striking in solidarity with their fellow workers across the country. They join a total of over 100 stores participating in Red Cup Rebellion, a nationwide unfair labor practice (ULP) strike demanding Starbucks fully staff all union stores and begin bargaining in good faith.
Red Cup Rebellion takes place the same day as the corporation’s Red Cup Day, on which thousands of Starbucks locations across the country will offer customers a branded Starbucks cup with select purchases. Striking workers will be demonstrating outside of their stores and handing out Starbucks Workers United branded cups to customers instead.
Starbucks partners are the face and cornerstone of the Company, yet they are forced into running perpetually understaffed stores, and given inconsistent schedules they can’t rely on. Conditions like these are what led Starbucks partners nationwide to begin unionizing, and the Company has only responded with disdain and disregard for its employees. Now, Starbucks partners are demanding the Company meet them at the bargaining table to create improved standards in staffing and scheduling, along with a host of other bargaining proposals that have been crafted by partner leaders across the country.
“Since we won our vote to unionize our store back in may, it feels like we are being ignored [by Starbucks], left on the back burner,” said Cassidy Elliott, barista at the Indian School Road store. “Like we have patiently had our hand raised to speak, but are constantly overlooked while the conversation moves on without us. It’s time for us to raise our voice, we want to be heard.”
Starbucks Workers United represents over 250 locations accounting for nearly 7,000 workers in the country. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) has issued 39 official complaints against Starbucks, encompassing over 900 alleged violations of federal labor law.
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