Union Campaign Hits Home for Starbucks

Two company roasteries in Seattle now have approved collective bargaining

By Newser Editors and Wire Services

Posted Apr 22, 2022 5:35 PM CDT

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Flagship Starbucks Goes Union — Emily Sirisue shows her support Thursday with other Seattle Starbucks baristas as the results came in on the vote to unionize at the roastery on Capitol Hill. (Ellen M. Banner/The Seattle Times via AP)

Starbucks workers at the coffee giant's flagship roastery in Seattle voted Thursday to form a union, the chain's latest location to do so. The Seattle store voted 38-27 to unionize. Workers United said 26 Starbucks locations have unionized nationwide. The Starbucks Reserve and Roastery in the Capitol Hill neighborhood is the company's second to unionize in its hometown of Seattle, the AP reports. "As we have said throughout, we will respect the process and will bargain in good faith. We hope that the union does the same," Reggie Borges, a spokesman for Starbucks, said in a statement.

The vote approved joining Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union, per the Seattle Times. Starbucks has multiple flagship stores, and the Seattle outlet joined the one in New York in forming a union. "A big part of it is just that we don't have a seat at the table, we don't have a voice in our workplace," said Liz Duran, an operations lead at Starbucks. "People have been pushed to the edge more and more and more throughout recent years, and with the breaking point being over, the COVID pandemic really just bringing workers to a point where you realize the power that we really do have."

(More Starbucks stories.)

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