As of October 2024, over 11,000 workers at 500 Starbucks stores in at least 40 states in the United States have voted to unionize, primarily with Workers United.[1] Workers United and Starbucks have been engaged in negotiations over a national collective bargaining agreement since February 2024.[2] This unionization effort started at a store in Buffalo, New York. About a third of Starbucks' Chilean workforce is already unionized, as well as 450 workers in New Zealand and eight stores in Canada. The longest Starbucks strike lasted 64 days, took place in Brookline, Massachusetts in September 2022 and resulted in the unionization of the employees at that location.
Starbucks Workers United has conducted strikes at over 190 store locations for more than 450 total days striking. SBWU has conducted numerous strikes over the course of its campaign. The largest strike action to date was on March 22, 2023, where 117 union locations staged the "One Day Longer, One Day Stronger" strike to commemorate outlasting interim-CEO Howard Schultz, who resigned prior to the Senate HELP committee hearing on union-busting sanctioned by Schultz.
Previously in the United States, there had been inconsistent unionization efforts beginning in the 1980s. Many of those unions folded, in part due to the company's long history of opposing unionization efforts. Warehouse and roasting plant workers in Seattle were Starbucks' first to unionize in 1985. During contract negotiation, the bargaining unit expanded to include store workers but the same workers moved to decertify their representation within two years.
Starbucks stores and a distribution plant unionized in British Columbia in the mid-1990s through the mid-2000s. The company strongly opposed unionization efforts in the 2000s through present day, with multiple National Labor Relations Board complaints ending in settlements or findings of labor law violations. The Industrial Workers of the World led an organizing campaign in the mid-2000s based in New York City that did not result in union recognition.
In December 2021, the Elmwood Avenue store in Buffalo became the first location in the United States to unionize in the 2020s. The first union vote in Starbucks' hometown of Seattle was unanimously in favor of the union.
- ^ Campbell, Braden (October 16, 2024). "As 500th Starbucks Unionizes, A Changed Campaign Persists". Law360. Retrieved October 17, 2024.
- ^ Burt, Kristian (October 1, 2024). "500 Starbucks locations have voted to unionize as labor talks continue". CNBC. Retrieved October 17, 2024.
The union and Starbucks announced together in February that negotiations would be taking place through a collaborative process to work toward a foundational framework.