Starbucks union grows roots in Indiana; organizers say more on horizon
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What was a logo for personalized coffee orders and green aprons could now be seen as the symbol of a growing tide of unionization looking to expand across the food service industry.
National collective Starbucks Workers United and individual store unions seek greater power in bargaining contracts and establishing workplaces they feel are held accountable and provide a livable wage. In the past year, three Starbucks locations in Indiana have unionized or are in the process of doing so.
Over 335 of the nearly 9,300 Starbucks in the country have unionized since the first did so in Buffalo, New York, in late 2021. Indiana accounts for about 220 of the total stores.
Two Indiana stores have unionized so far: Clarksville in July 2022 and Valparaiso in February. The Bloomington Eastside location at Third Street and the 46 Bypass is the latest to join the movement in late June after they filed paperwork with the National Labor Relations Board to unionize. They will vote in the coming weeks.
In a public letter to CEO Laxman Narasimhan signed by 13 Bloomington employees, the workers said they’ve had to meet “impossible” production expectations while working through fluctuating scheduling and walking the line of losing health care coverage. The Clarksville and Valparaiso stores called for unionization on similar complaints. The Bloomington letter also mentioned an event when the store’s pride flag was taken down.
“By conceding to those who threaten homophobic and transphobic violence, you are inviting those people not only into our store, but society at large, and putting our majority-LGBT workforce in even more danger,” the letter read. “while simultaneously profiting off of those same overworked LGBT workers that are perpetually dancing on the knife’s edge of poverty.”
Employees take issue with Narasimhan’s million-dollar salary amidst ground level hour and benefit issues. The company reported in November record fiscal year net revenues of $32.3 billion.
Starbucks did not respond to Inside INdiana Business’s multiple requests for comment prior to publication but responded afterward.
“More than 97% of our partners at our more than 9,300 U.S. company-owned stores have chosen to maintain a direct employment relationship with Starbucks,” the company statement said. “We recognize that a subset of partners feel differently—and we respect their right to organize and to engage in lawful union activities without fear of reprisal or retaliation.”
A company spokesperson said over email the company supports the LGBTQ community, did not ban Pride decorations and offers opportunities for workers to pick up more hours. They also said they have increased the average hours per week for baristas year-over-year.
The spokesperson said Workers United is making reckless and false claims regarding the chain’s treatment of LGBTQ workers.
“We remain deeply concerned by false information being spread about our inclusive store environments, our company culture and the benefits we offer our partners,” the spokesperson said.
As hours worked shrink, benefit eligibility becomes uncertain
Before launching its union bid, the Bloomington store was “union sympathetic,” as organizer and barista Stefanie Sharp described it, based on their experiences and the national conversation.
In January, she said she, her coworkers and stores across the nation started to see significant hour cuts below 20 hours a week and outside the promised threshold.
For some, those cuts hold severe consequence beyond a smaller paycheck to live off of.
Starbucks boasts health care coverage for its workers. However, those benefits are contingent on the number of hours worked. Part-time workers must total at least 240 hours over three-month increments, averaging about 20 hours a week, to keep their coverage for the next cycle.
Due to this system, panic often plays out behind the register as each hour has implications, and a shift assigned to one barista may mean losing health care coverage for another. It pits workers against each other to hit thresholds for health care coverage, Sharp said.
“They brag about the benefits, but then do everything they can to prevent us from getting it in the first place,” Sharp said.
Clarksville barista Mila Renae Wade said she routinely worked 40-hour weeks for about a year before her hours were slashed. She said she was continually being scheduled at 19 hours and had to use her vacation time to prevent herself from losing her health care benefits. For the part-time job Wade started for health care coverage, she had to get a second job to support herself.
“The pay is just not anywhere near what it should be for how specialized the job is,” Wade said. “Starbucks offers all these benefits, like the ones I’ve used and once others have used, but they do that to keep you on the hook. It’s not about investing into the workers or supporting them in any way.”
Sharp and Wade both say their stores were intensely understaffed as a result.
Starbucks raised its hourly minimum wage to $15 in 2021, potentially in response to initial unionization efforts. At face value, that wage is higher than similar jobs. However, Sharp, Wade and other workers say the wages are minimized in context with the number of hours available.
Sharp talks about the work environment at the company and the decision to unionize.
Waning hours means smaller paychecks, Sharp said, and coupled with inflation and bills, it’s not enough to make ends meet. They can’t build monthly budgets or not worry about making rent because the schedules vary so often.
“We’ve been conditioned to be okay with these exploitative and abusive dynamics,” she said.
The company knows it underpays its workers, Sharp said, demonstrated by the establishment of the Cup Fund. The emergency grant program is supported by employee donations and fundraisers and is meant to help workers going through financial crises. That in itself, Sharp said, is the company admitting its employees are not paid enough to withstand such hard times.
“It’s normal small talk about how my bank account has hit the negative,” she said. “Whenever (customers) show us their phone to scan their Starbucks cards, they’ll have more money on their Starbucks cards than we will have in our bank accounts.”
Both Sharp and Wade also said product prices will go up anyway, and unionizing efforts don’t affect it as much as the company lets on. They said it’s another excuse as Starbucks continues to make record profits.
Defining moments push unionization efforts ahead
Wade was the primary organizer of the Clarksville union push. There had been issues since she arrived in May 2021, but she said they weren’t seeing the numbers in support needed to unionize. It was when the longest-serving floor member was fired without any prior offenses that tipped the scales, she said.
After unionizing, Wade said the store was on corporate’s radar, and subsequently, flooded with managers — a reaction similarly reported in other unionized stores across the country. It was part of an effort to intimidate and surveil them, she said.
She alleges Starbucks stripped her of her disability accommodations for six weeks as retaliation, which she believes was because she had been an outspoken leader for the movement. She also said she has overheard and received threatening messages from management and corporate.
The defining moment for the Bloomington store was when its Pride flag was taken down during Pride Month and on the new manager’s first day per company order, Sharp said. When questioned about it, Sharp said she was told it was company policy but received multiple conflicting answers over time.
At the moment it happened, she and everyone working on the floor walked to the back, making the store temporarily inoperable. They knew of other stores where flags were stripped but also of stores in more liberal areas with them still up. They were told they could have flags in the back of house and keep the chalkboard mural inside. However, the answers they received regarding the outside flag was the company gaslighting them in their eyes, Sharp said.
That was a boiling point for many, Sharp said, and the subtle comments and unspoken thoughts to unionize became reality for one of the highest volume stores in the state.
Bigger than Starbucks
Baristas and Workers United have the same answer when asked why don’t they go work somewhere else: they like their jobs and want to promote a better workplace. They also know their conditions are reflective and often better than that of the larger food industry. They believe it’s an opportunity to inspire drastic change.
Food service unionizing was something outside the realm of possibility for many, Wade said, but Starbucks workers’ push shows others it’s not impossible. She said it’s bigger than just her store and Starbucks; it’s something many thought would not be possible in food service.
“We’re all, I guess, interconnected in a way that we never would have been before,” Wade said. “We’re all just workers trying to get the best life we can for each other, regardless of industry.”
Looking back on labor history, Wade said it’s readily apparent how important of a role unions have when talking about wealth inequality and workers’ rights. Every workplace should have a union, she said, so management can’t take on the role of a dictator.
Regarding stereotypes of unionized workers being lazy or ineffective, Wade said that’s not her experience. She and others are enthusiastic and want to produce the best service and product possible because they fought so hard to continue doing so.
Clarksville barista and union organizer Mila Renae Wade talks about the store after unionizing and expansion of the movement across the industry.
Wade is older than most of the people she worked with, so by pursuing this unionization effort, she hoped it was a learning experience for her coworkers. Since the unionizing, she said they have felt of wave a success whether it be a taste of worker empowerment or optimism in pursuing unfair labor practice charges. The store also went on strike for three days last December, effectively closing the store, in support of national unionization efforts.
“With a union, we have been able to advocate for each other, stand up for each other,” Wade said. “Not let them, you know, stomp on us quite so much as they used to.”
Sharp hopes the momentum continues to mount for unions. The nature of employment at Starbucks and chains across the county take the power out of the hands of its workers since they are replaceable, she said. The way her position and most others in the industry are built is exploitative, she said, and moving to another job does not solve the overarching problem.
“Because whenever you go somewhere else, they have all the leverage because you’re only one replaceable individual,” she said. “The only way to structurally change that system is through collective action and unionization.”
The idea of a collective action was needed for people to be on board at her store, she said. The company holds a lot of power over its workers, Sharp said, and people are afraid to be the first to stand up.
“This isn’t just a Starbucks thing,” Sharp said. “This is an economy-wide thing.”