Four Los Angeles-area Starbucks shops closed Friday morning as staff took to the picket line, becoming a member of a three-day nationwide strike of unionized baristas and different workers demanding higher therapy from their company leaders.
The strike is the second by Starbucks staff in recent weeks over considerations that the Seattle-based chain has unfairly retaliated towards unionized workers and did not cut price in good religion to achieve first-time contracts.
“We’re on strike right now … demanding it stop closing union stores, they reopen the stores they have closed, and [stop] their union-busting campaign against us,” mentioned Tyler Keeling, a union organizer on the Lakewood Starbucks on Candlewood Street. Strikers plan to stay on the picket line via Sunday, forcing the 4 shops to stay closed.
Starbucks, in a assertion, mentioned that the corporate had “no tolerance for any unlawful anti-union behavior” and that it had continued to schedule bargaining periods with union members so “their voices are heard.”
“It is unfortunate that Workers United continues to spread misleading claims while disrupting the Starbucks Experience that our partners and customers have come to love and expect,” the assertion mentioned.
The different closed shops have been at 3390 E. seventh St. in Long Beach and, in Los Angeles, at 138 S. Central Ave. and 3241 Figueroa St.
Veronica Gonzalez, who works on the Figueroa Street location in Cypress Park, joined the picket line Friday with about 10 different workers, standing within the driveway of the espresso store with indicators that mentioned “Strike!” and “No contract, no coffee!”
Every jiffy, drivers honked their horns or waved in assist of the placing baristas.
“Starbucks is doubling down in the union busting, so we’re going to double down,” mentioned Gonzalez, a barista who has labored on the retailer for 3 years. “They want to shut down stores, we’re going to show them we can shut down stores too.”
Striking Starbucks workers attraction to passing motorists at a Starbucks retailer in Long Beach on Friday.
(Luis Sinco / Los Angeles Times)
The shops are amongst 270 Starbucks areas throughout the nation which have unionized within the final yr — a part of a wave of labor movements that has swept the nation, together with a strike by University of California academic workers and organizing by Amazon warehouse staff. The Workers United guild, which represents Starbucks staff, mentioned about 100 shops throughout the U.S. have been on strike starting Friday.
“Every step we take is inspiring more workers to take power back to themselves and to create change in the workplace,” Keeling mentioned. “We don’t have to sit down and accept these horrible working conditions; we can make a change.”
Starbucks, citing security considerations, lately introduced the permanent closure of the first Seattle location to unionize; union leaders famous the closure fell close to the primary anniversary of the first Starbucks successful a union election. Workers United known as it a part of an “anti-union campaign” by the corporate.
The chain closed a variety of Starbucks shops this summer season, additionally citing security causes, including six in L.A. None of the areas in Los Angeles have been union outlets, however union leaders on the time considered the transfer as a “response to the growing union movement spreading across the country.”
The relationship between Starbucks — which opposes unionization — and its unionized staff has change into more and more contentious during the last yr, with Workers United leaders asking a federal court docket to intervene four times in issues of alleged unfair labor practices, such because the firing of union leaders and the withholding of pay hikes. Starbucks has additionally alleged unfair labor practices by the union.
The firm has requested the nationwide labor board to temporarily halt all U.S. union elections, citing allegations that regional labor officers in Kansas improperly coordinated with unionizing workers.
“We remain focused on working together … to make Starbucks a company that works for everyone,” the assertion from the corporate mentioned. Starbucks touted its attendance at bargaining periods; officers deliberate to seem at greater than 75 periods via the top of the yr. But L.A.-area union leaders mentioned not one of the periods had led to significant discussions.
“We were literally reading our proposals to them and they walked out while we were still speaking,” mentioned Josie Serrano, a barista on the East seventh Street retailer in Long Beach. Other union leaders mentioned their shops’ bargaining periods lasted simply minutes earlier than Starbucks’ representatives left.
“We want them to negotiate in good faith,” mentioned Araseli Romero, a 22-year-old shift supervisor on the Central Avenue location. She mentioned the newest bargaining session lasted seven minutes earlier than administration and attorneys walked out.
Workers in any respect 4 areas maintained that there have been issues with defective tools, that they have been short-staffed regardless of staff being obtainable to work, and that they got too few hours to qualify for advantages.
At the Figueroa Street location, protesters cheered as vehicles honked and waved, they usually talked in regards to the points with passersby. One driver in Long Beach caught a thumbs-up out the window, yelling, “Let’s go!” A Metro bus driver held down his horn as he handed the espresso store’s picketers.
But some weren’t supportive of the strike, as they tried to get espresso on the closed outlets. Darren Burtenshaw walks every single day to the Central Avenue store together with his canine Eros and mentioned he was disenchanted to see workers taking a stand towards a firm that he noticed as higher than most — providing greater than minimal wage and packages to assist pay for school.
“They should be targeting other places and big corporations,” the 57-year-old mentioned. Starbucks “is actually doing very well by their employees.”
But Gonzalez mentioned that was precisely why she joined the union and was on the picket line: to assist individuals perceive the situations workers really confronted.
“They claim to be people over profit, but they’re really not,” she mentioned. “We don’t see things getting better, and if we’re not going to stand up for ourselves, who is?”