Unionized Starbucks workers begin nationwide strike

SEATTLE – Starbucks workers blocked a coffeehouse drive-thru, store entrances were locked on a weekday morning, and a demonstrator in an inflatable rat costume joined the picket. These were a few of the scenes at two Seattle stores that took part in a nationwide union strike Thursday.

A University District store, 4147 University Way NE, and a West Queen Anne store, 1144 Elliott Ave. W., both saw picket lines on the morning of Starbucks’ Red Cup Day, a major holiday promotional event.

The strikes are part of a nationwide effort by Starbucks Workers United, the union representing thousands of baristas, to move the needle on stalled contract negotiations with the Seattle-based coffee giant.

The union estimated Thursday that more than 1,000 baristas across more than 65 stores in about 40 cities were participating in the strike.

Redmond was originally listed by Workers United as an affected city, but the union’s online map of active picket lines did not include any Redmond stores as of Thursday morning.

Starbucks spokesperson Jaci Anderson said the company is seeing “minimal impact across the board.” She said 99% of Starbucks coffeehouses remain open.

“Based on what we’ve seen this morning, we’re on track to exceed our sales expectations for the day across company-operated coffeehouses in North America,” Anderson said.

In Seattle, workers at the two coffeehouses began their strike Thursday morning. The stores closed for the rest of the day.

At the West Queen Anne store, drivers entered and quickly exited the parking lot without their morning doses of caffeine. Shift supervisor Brenna Nendel, 24, said she hoped that drove home the point of the strike.

“We are encouraging customers to boycott Starbucks while we’re on strike, just to help us do the most amount of damage to the company as possible and convince them,” she said, as rain fell on her and more than a dozen other picketers.

“It’s cheaper for them to settle quickly than it is for us to continue to do this for a long time,” Nendel added. The workers at her coffeehouse unionized in 2022.

Starbucks and Workers United have been at the bargaining table since early 2024, following the first union election win in 2021.

In their first contract, which has yet to be finalized, baristas are seeking increased hours, higher take-home pay and resolution of labor law violations.

Sara Kelly, chief partner officer at the coffee giant, recently said some of Workers United’s proposed terms weren’t “serious, evidence-based proposals.”

The brouhaha has caught the attention of Sen. Patty Murray, who sent a letter to Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol Wednesday urging him to reach a collective bargaining agreement with the union.

On Monday, 26 Democratic senators pressed Starbucks to “stop its illegal union-busting campaign” in a letter sent to Niccol.

“As you well know Starbucks is not a poor company,” the lawmakers wrote. “Despite that extravagant spending on executives and shareholders, Starbucks refuses to reach an agreement with its own workers even though you are less than one average day’s sales apart from a contract.”

Niccol, who assumed his role in September 2024, previously told Workers United that he respected the right to union representation, according to media reports.

He didn’t respond directly to the call by lawmakers this week. But Anderson told the Seattle Times that “we’re disappointed that Workers United, who represents less than 4% of our partners, has called for a strike instead of returning to the bargaining table.”

Niccol is in the midst of major changes at the company. One has been his $1 billion restructuring plan announced in September. The most controversial aspects: layoffs and store closures.

Niccol originally said 900 corporate employees would be laid off, and an unidentified number of stores would shutter around North America. A total of 627 stores closed, including more than 30 Washington locations.

Almost 1,000 retail and nonretail workers were laid off in Seattle and Kent last month, and coffeehouse shutterings led to the layoffs of 369 retail employees in Washington.

Those follow the layoffs of 1,100 corporate employees in February.

Future strikes planned

For now, the strikes will continue.

A union rally is set for 4 p.m. Thursday at the shuttered Starbucks Reserve Roastery at 1124 Pike St. on Capitol Hill, with Seattle Mayor-elect Katie Wilson expected to attend.

Strikes are scheduled at the West Queen Anne and University District stores through at least Nov. 18. Emma Cox, a barista at the University District coffeehouse, called it an “indefinite” strike.

“This is my third Red Cup Day strike,” they said. The union has previously held strikes on the annual Red Cup Day.

Cox was one of about two dozen picketers standing on the corner of University Way NE and NE 42nd Street. They cheered when passing drivers honked to show their support.

Meanwhile, all was quiet inside the shuttered Starbucks store, with chairs stacked upside down on tables.

“It feels like we’re back out here again and again and again, just like begging for the company to respect us as workers,” Cox, 25, said.