LOUISVILLE, Ky. — On Starbucks’ Red Cup Day workers at the Factory Lane location stood outside with signs reciting chants like “1,2,3,4 no one should be working poor.” Red Cup Day is a chance for customers to get a free limited-edition holiday theme reusable cup.
Psychology student Fern Potter has been working at the Starbucks location for almost a year. He’s been fighting for better working conditions for almost as long.
“We’re out here today because Starbucks refuses to bargain in good faith with us. They are required by federal labor laws here days in good faith bargaining and they have not been doing that,” Potter said.
The store’s shift supervisor said meetings set to discuss their concerns have been delayed, canceled, or held in faraway places.
That’s why employees from the store joined those of over 100 stores nationwide that went on strike on one of the company’s busiest days.
“It was very strategically picked wanting to cause the maximum amount of harm to their profits,” says Potter.
Fairer wages are at the top of the list of their demands. “I think everyone that works at Starbucks knows the fear of homelessness and the fear of not being able to afford food and transportation. I’m definitely not alone in that. Income is one of the biggest things that we’re fighting for in our contract. Everyone deserves a comfortable living wage,” Potter said.
Emerson Mays has also been working at the store for about a year. She said that being understaffed adds to union workers’ frustrations.
“There’s a lot of challenges working at a Starbucks, especially one that is not designed to do that volume, so that presents a lot of safety hazards and I feel like we’re not fairly compensated for the work that we do, but we’re doing double,” Mays explained.
Mays and Potter hope the strike makes the company wake up and smell the coffee.
“The more strikes we have and the more people that become in support of unions, it’s gonna become increasingly clear to the union that they’re not gonna have a choice soon enough and, they’re gonna have to start giving us concessions to bargain with us, otherwise we’re gonna shut them down,” Potter said.
Potter also said that organizing strikes is his new passion, and that he plans to change his major to pursue something more related to the activity.
Employees said their strike has gotten overwhelmingly positive responses from customers. There were some, however, who were not happy to miss out on the specialty red cups and their usual coffee drinks.