ENCINITAS, Calif.–Employees at the Encinitas Starbucks store, the first in San Diego County to join the Starbucks Workers United union, shut down the store for the entire day on June 30. The workers brought a dual message to the media, customers, and passersby: They were out to protest Starbucks’ national ban on Pride Month decorations at its stores and to demand that management start negotiating with the union.
“We stand in solidarity with LGBTQ partners across the nation who have been prohibited from expressing their pride. We hope to put pressure on the company to bargain with their partners in good faith as is their responsibility” said striker Denika Brown.
Picket captain Shea Kaplan reported the employees marched on the boss the previous day and read out loud a letter expressing the workers’ demands to remedy numerous unfair labor practices. Among the ULP’s cited in the letter:
- Lack of sufficient staffing
- Reduction of hours, resulting in loss of education and health benefits
- Insufficient breaks, including restroom breaks
- Being forced to stay past shift time
- Managers removing legally permitted posting of Weingarten rights and placing of union literature in the breakroom, both permitted under National Labor Relations Board decisions. Weingarten rights allow a worker fearing being disciplined to bring an advocate/witness to the meeting. Usually, the advocate is the union rep or shop steward.
Said Kaplan: “During the duration of me reading it (our letter) my boss was on her phone and texting. Immediately following the march our district manager and multiple other managers showed up in our store for a so-called meeting.
“They never meet at our store because we have no seating so they likely intended this to be an intimidation tactic and to staff the store if we walked out. One partner also overheard our manager laughing about what we wrote with another manager.”
Located a few blocks from one of the country’s most popular beach holiday and surfing areas, employees at the Leucadia & I-5 store–the store’s official corporate name–held the strike action as part of the week of Strike With Pride.
The week of rolling strikes was called by the national union Starbucks Workers United (SWU) in protest against Starbucks’ unfair labor practice (ULP) of banning LGBTQ Pride flags and decorations.
First store to be struck
The first store to be struck was Starbucks’s home store in downtown Seattle. Eventually, some 1,500 workers were forced to strike over the two issues. Striking Starbucks workers in New York City marched in the Gay Pride parade there, surrounding the company’s float with signs and flags to tell the crowd what Starbucks is really like.
Pride displays have become a tradition in the last few years at Starbucks stores across the country. One passerby in Encinitas on strike day commented they bought stock in Starbucks years ago because of the company’s stated support of LGBTQ rights and was dismayed to learn the company is banning such displays.
The Leucadia & I-5 store, the first Starbucks in San Diego County to go union, voted 21-2 to join the union six weeks ago. This same week employees at another Starbucks in the county, in the Hillcrest area, announced their intent to join the union.
The Encinitas employees are also educating the public about Starbucks’ delaying tactics in coming to the bargaining table. “They keep making excuses to postpone these (negotiations) meetings,” one striker told Peoples World.
Strikers cited numerous ULPs documenting how drastically working conditions deteriorated:
“When I first started here, we had two people at the cold station alone, five others at the other stations, seven total, and we had time to tend to our patrons in a more personal manner. Now they (management) put two, maybe three people to staff the entire store.
“I peed myself from not getting a bathroom break.
“The managers say two or three people are enough, and that business is too slow.”
Strikers spoke of having to live with their parents long term, of having to scrap hopes of marrying and raising a family, of achieving higher education and professional careers, resulting from cuts in pay and hours, which as the workers themselves said, is clear retaliation for unionizing.
Picket captain Shea Kaplan said their store alone brings in around $8,000-$11,000 a day. Starbucks’ 2022 revenue topped $32 billion, out of which the company is spending an undisclosed sum to hire the notorious union-busting firm, Littler Mendelson.
Starbucks has been able to labor-wash their reputation by advertising their college subsidy program, in which the company helps subsidize college costs for Starbucks “partners” (workers). To qualify for the subsidy, a worker has to clock a certain amount of hours. To punish and discourage union drives, the company has cut workers’ hours, making them ineligible for the college stipend.
The Encinitas workers say they know they have a lot of work ahead of them to get management to the bargaining table and to secure a good contract. But they managed to organize together to unionize, and they are determined to get a good contract, with the support of the SWU, the wider labor community, as well as sympathetic customers and community members.
Donate by visiting the shop at https://sbworkersunited.org/.
To receive alerts about rallies, pickets, and other SWU events in your area, fill in the #NoContractNoCoffee! solidarity pledge: https://crm.broadstripes.com/ctf/SJID0H
Veronica Gonzalez and Shea Kaplan contributed to this article.
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