Mickey Z
Cool Observer
Friday, August 27, 2004
Solidarity with Starbucks Workers
It’s easy--and accurate--to identify Starbucks as a high-profile symbol of corporate culture and creeping homogenization...but this does nothing to help those who toil behind the counter in an often futile attempt to make ends meet. Running concurrent with our efforts against corporate domination is a movement to support those workers. This article is an excellent primer:
‘They’re as Bad as Walmart’: Starbucks Workers get Organized!
By Derek Seidman
Two days after workers at the 36th and Madison Starbucks in New York City turned in their union cards to the NLRB for a certification election, Howard Schultz, the CEO of Starbucks, sent them a little voice message. In this dispatch from the corporate tower, Schultz—who personally brought in $17 million last year—tried to appeal to the $7.75-per-hour upstarts in words that would impress George Orwell.
The multi-millionaire CEO began his message by referring to his poverty-wage employees as “partners,” and stressed how Starbucks and its workers “have built great trust in one another.” He went on to explain that he viewed “treating everyone with dignity and respect as our highest priority,” and stressed the “caring and supportive culture” of the company. He ended with this note of pure authenticity: “I want to conclude by simply thanking you for everything you do each day, and for being the real heart and soul of Starbucks.”
Not surprisingly, the workers saw right through this corporate textbook mumbo-jumbo. Their experience had taught them better. Their story and their ongoing struggle for the first unionized Starbucks locale of the more than 4,000 Starbucks in the United States is vitally important and in need of our support.
To read the complete article and learn how to help the workers, click here:
http://www.pressaction.com/news/weblog/full_article/seidman08262004/
Copyright © 2005-2007 Mickey Z.
