This story was updated on December 18, 2022 at 8:30am CST.
Workers at a second San Antonio Starbucks store joined their downtown colleagues on Sunday as nearly 100 stores around the country participated in a 3-day unfair labor practice strike. The labor action was driven by workers’ complaints of the company’s intensifying union-busting campaign, which they say involves shutting down union stores.
Parker Davis, a union organizer at the Wurzbach and Blanco store which voted to unionize in August, explained why his coworkers decided to join the strike.
“I think a very poignant reason why my store decided to strike on the third day was the effects bargaining that we had to undergo recently for a store closure we had in November,” Davis said.
Effects bargaining is a type of labor negotiation when a union is or would be impacted by certain decisions management makes, such as an unscheduled closure. Unions have the right to effects bargaining even if they do not yet have a contract, as is the case with Davis’ store.
“During that store closure, we were scheduled hours and the company refused to pay us the hours that we would’ve worked, that we couldn’t work due to the closure, and partners were relying on this money to make ends meet, to pay rent,” he said. “And so we decided that we had to do something.”
As a result of that bargaining, Davis and his coworkers were able to get management to pay workers for the hours they had been scheduled to work. He said this is not just about pay, but these hours are critical for workers to retain eligibility for Starbucks’ benefits like free tuition at ASU online or health care.
Davis said his coworkers felt ready to strike in large part because of the support of colleagues at other union stores, such as the East Houston and St. Mary’s store downtown which has been on strike since Friday.
“We’ve been in contact with Houston-St. Mary’s, we’ve been in contact with [Loop] 410 Vance Jackson, which is also a unionized store,” he said. “We’ve just been discussing how our store can best prepare for this action, and the tips and tricks that Houston St. Mary’s currently has under their belt because they’re kind of experienced at this now.”
On Saturday, workers at the downtown Starbucks on East Houston and St. Mary’s continued with the second day of their strike, despite efforts by management to open the store.
Management opened the downtown store for a few hours on Saturday before closing in the early afternoon. Seiya Wayment, a lead union organizer at the store, said management hadn’t been very successful at getting customers in the door.
“It’s a little sad that they opened the store, but they’re definitely not getting the business they would,” Wayment said. “It actually looks like they’re shutting down. I don’t think management works in the evenings.”
The 3-day strike of nearly 100 Starbucks stores around the country is driven by what workers say is the company’s increasingly bold union-busting efforts, which includes shutting down union stores on false pretexts of safety concerns.
On the second day of the strike, Wayment said spirits remained high among their coworkers and supporters.
“Oh we’re having a good time,” they said. “We had a little bit of a sing along over here until we had a guitar string break, but we’ve been throwing a party.”
Alex Coy, an IATSE union member at a local public theater, joined Starbucks workers on the picket line on Saturday. He said he felt it was his duty to show up.
“We’re all in the same struggle, we’re all from the same class, so we gotta turn up for each other if we wanna have any hope of changing things,” Coy said.
Coy said he was inspired by the Starbucks strike and growing labor activity around the country.
“I am thrilled that the trend seems to be more union participation, more union elections, and more militant strike actions,” he said. “I grew up in the ‘90s after the air traffic controller strike, when it seemed like the final nail in the coffin of the American labor movement had been hammered, so that we seem to be turning a bend I think is a great sign.”
