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In May 2022, workers at the Midtown Starbucks in Birmingham voted overwhelmingly to unionize with Starbucks Workers United. Months later, in a nailbiter 9-8 election, baristas at a Scottsboro location followed suit.
In the less than four years since SBWU won its first union election, more than 500 Starbucks locations across the country have unionized, but the union’s over ten thousand members are still waiting on a first contract. Hundreds of delegates from SBWU stores have been at the bargaining table with Starbucks since the company reopened negotiations this past February.
Naomi, a Starbucks worker at the unionized location in Birmingham, told APR that she first applied to work there over a year ago because she was “really, really excited” to work alongside people also interested in trying to improve the community. Drawing an implicit comparison, she recounted being involved in political organizing in Texas before she moved to Birmingham.
In Alabama, only 7.5 percent of workers are members of a labor union and the state’s Republican politicians frequently criticize union organizing efforts. Earlier this year, Gov. Kay Ivey signed a bill that penalizes employers voluntarily recognizing unions. But in Birmingham at least, Naomi says the unionized Starbucks enjoys a “lot of community support.”
Being “located so close to UAB, there are a lot of younger college students” willing to support the store, she explained.
Only the two Starbucks locations in Alabama have been unionized so far, but a good first contract may well galvanize additional organizing. After the United Auto Workers won new contracts in its Stand Up Strike, the union began organizing Southern auto plants, to mixed results.
Naomi explained to APR that one thing she grew to recognize as an SBWU member is “how similar our problems are throughout the country,” pointing to “wages being low and bills getting higher.”
Jack Maurer, a graduate of the University of Alabama, worked at an off-campus Starbucks last year and a Starbucks-licensed store in Arizona a couple years ago. In his experience, he said, “there were certainly times at both Starbucks stores when we didn’t have as many people on shift as we needed to perform well, and that can make the job a lot more challenging.”
Brenna Schnupp, currently a sophomore at UA, is a employee of one of the three Starbucks on the college’s campus.
When asked by APR about her experience working for an Alabama Starbucks, Schnupp said it’s “not the best, however it is not the worst.”
She explained that she feels the store needs a “better system for taking breaks,” believes “most employees are not certain how to make each drink” because of inadequate training, and thinks management needs to pay more attention to workers’ concerns.
SBWU’s website lists “guidelines for a 15 minute paid break” and optional “30-60 minute unpaid break[s]” as goals for the first contract, as well as improvements to training standards. The highlights however are a $20 per hour base wage, better healthcare and more time off, and guaranteed raises.
After being told about SBWU’s demands, Schnupp said that if they were implemented she believes she would “work with more of a purpose and at a faster pace” and her job “would feel almost meaningful.”
Elected by her coworkers as a bargaining delegate, Naomi told APR that she also wants to ensure “queer people are consulted and taken care of” in the first contract. Describing the union as “incredibly vibrant, incredibly diverse,” she stated that it’s important to make sure that queer workers and their rights are respected in the workplace.
But the SBWU’s success organizing Starbucks stores across the country has not been unimpeded.
While Maurer was a Starbucks employee, he wrote an opinion piece for the UA student paper, The Crimson White, about the “ethical ramifications of expanding Starbucks’ presence on campus.” The University was in the middle of constructing its third Starbucks, a drive-through only location on University Boulevard.
In his op-ed, Maurer told readers that “Starbucks has repeatedly been ordered to stop practices that violate labor laws.” In just the period after Maurer’s piece was published in June 2023, the NLRB has ruled former Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz illegally threatened an employee, ordered that several Starbucks locations closed for “antiunion reasons” be reopened, and found that the company issued multiple illegal subpoenas.
“For a company that wants to signal to its workers that it respects them and values their rights, those actions can undermine that message,” Maurer told APR. But he also expressed his personal skepticism about the efficacy of the NLRB’s penalties. If the penalties were substantial enough, Maurer posited, Starbucks wouldn’t think union busting is worth the risk.
Naomi was more optimistic, however, saying she’s “pretty happy to see that the NLRB has been protecting workers’ rights.”
Starbucks, alongside other household names like Amazon, Trader Joe’s, and SpaceX, is currently arguing before the Supreme Court that the National Labor Relations Board is unconstitutional.
But for now at least, SBWU and Starbucks are still deep in negotiations, with both parties hoping to approve and ratify a new contract before 2025.
In a letter sent to Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol in September, SBWU said, “We very much look forward to building on the progress we have made to date and reaching our mutual goal of ratified contracts by the end of the year.”
Responding, Niccol said the company is “committed to continue to bargain in good faith with you and your teams and make progress together.”
