Unite Baristas! Reconsidered!

We posted yesterday on the push to unionize Starbucks cafes in Manhattan and a few emails and a few suspicious late night phone calls to Seattlest’s home phone from “private number” and we’re ready to give you the other side of the story. Actually we looked for this stuff before we posted yesterday, but couldn’t find any response from Starbucks on the issue of unions or critiques of their health care packages. Don’t acknowledge nuthin, won’t be nuthin.

From Seattlest’s inbox on the subject of unionized Starbucks locations:

Although the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) at times calls itself the “Starbucks Workers Union,” they have not been certified by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) as the representative of any Starbucks partners. There are no unionized Starbucks stores anywhere in the United States. In fact, the night before there was to be a vote on one New York City store’s efforts to unionize in July 2004, the IWW withdrew its position, and no vote was held. We believe the IWW lacked the support of Starbucks’ partners. A few partners in one store in New York, who are in the minority of the more than 100,000 partners who work for Starbucks worldwide, instigated the IWW activity.

And on health care:

In terms of the health care piece of your posting, IWW pressure did not make Starbucks release its health care information. Starbucks released health insurance information in May 2004 and more recently in December 2005 for a Wall Street Journal column, where the correct figures appeared: “65% of Starbucks employees are eligible for health benefits after two months on the job, and 65% of this group, or about 42% of its total work force, enroll. (That compares with 46% of employees with health benefits at retail companies, where they typically must be full-timers to qualify.)”:

All in all it’s pretty tame for a “you don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about” email (and we should know). That’s so cute how they call their employees “partners” isn’t it? Is that how they greet each other in the morning? “Hello, Partner Todd! Good Morning - Would you like a coffee-based drink?” “Why yes, Partner Meredith, I’d love a discounted beverage!”

We should also provide you with this very reasonable link and this stern document containing the offical Starbucks position on unions, some of which we've already clipped for you.