Still on strike, Starbucks union gains strength with organizing win in St. Paul

December 11, 2025 by

St. Paul baristas celebrate their successful union election at the Starbucks on West 7th Street. (@mnsbuxunited on Instagram)

Baristas at a Starbucks in St. Paul voted 18-1 in favor of forming a union with Workers United yesterday, as the union’s open-ended strike at over 130 cafés across the U.S. approaches the one-month point.

Workers at the Starbucks at 2525 West 7th St., near the intersection with Davern, filed for a union election Sept. 30, but the federal-government shutdown halted the National Labor Relations Board’s work, delaying the vote until Wednesday.

The organizing victory restores the number of Minnesota locations where workers have formed unions with Starbucks Workers United (SWU) to 14. Starbucks abruptly closed a unionized store at 300 Snelling Ave. S in September, giving workers just two days’ notice.

Union members at three Starbucks in the Twin Cities have joined the nationwide strike, according to a memo published by SWU. Workers have pledged to stay on strike until the company resumes negotiations over the framework for first contracts at its cafés.

The open-ended strike began Nov. 13, and baristas in St. Anthony were there for it, shutting down the store at 3704 Silverlake Rd. NE. They picketed along the busy street and held an afternoon rally in the parking lot, supported by dozens of community members and baristas from other stores.

Union members shut down the St. Anthony store on Day 1 of the nationwide strike.

Union baristas in Chanhassen began an open-ended strike at their store, located 190 Lake Dr. E, later that weekend. Workers at the Starbucks on the first floor of the Mall of American, near the rotunda, have since joined the strike too, according to SWU.

Anton Olson, an 11-year veteran of Starbucks who has worked the last five years in St. Anthony, said he and the two dozen other union members at the store were in the fight to win – as long as it takes.

“It’s a tough decision, but we have a bunch of people supporting us, and we’re supporting each other,” Olson said.

The easiest way to show support for Olson and other union baristas is to take the pledge at nocontractnocoffee.org. Striking baristas also welcome support on the picket line, with shifts and locations posted to an interactive map on the website.

And striking baristas plan to rally Dec. 20 at 2305 Fairview Avenue in Roseville, where workers voted to unionize in August 2022 but have not yet joined the strike.

In balloting that began Oct. 27, SWU members voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike, with 92% support from participating baristas across the country. But each unionized store is a unique bargaining unit, which decides on its own when – and whether – to join the strike.

SWU represents over 11,000 baristas at about 550 Starbucks locations nationwide.

SWU and the company announced an agreement in February 2024 to begin negotiating a framework contract on the national level, making it easier for workers to settle a first contract on the local level.

That process resulted in key gains, union members say, but talks have stalled since Brian Niccol became CEO in September 2024. The two sides entered mediation earlier this year, but in the six months leading up to the strike, Starbucks refused to offer new proposals in response to workers’ key demands.

Striking baristas and supporters picket in St. Anthony.

Those demands include better staffing, higher pay and resolution of hundreds of unfair labor practice charges from bargaining units across the country.

Lorelei Lind, who works at the Fairview Avenue location, said Starbucks has made “unlawful changes” to its policies without consulting baristas’ union — “limiting our dress code, targeting partners with piercings, denying customers access to free water.”

“I have seen partners – experienced partners – belittled, their opinions ignored and their experience undermined,” Lind added.

In failing to consult with its workers, Niccols and other executives ignored safety, customer-satisfaction and other concerns, St. Anthony union member Foren Lee added.

“Time and time again, we have reiterated our demands to Starbucks,” Lee said. “Time and time again, we have received nothing in return but unfair labor practices, ever-changing [and] unlawful policy changes, two-day-notice store closures that laid off thousands of baristas, and a menu that increasingly grows less and less simplified.”

Baristas know that won’t change without a union contract, and they won’t get it without solidarity.

“Four years of time has seen it proved that a contract will not be given to us,” Lind said. “We must fight for it.”

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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As baristas warn of strike, Starbucks closes MN’s first unionized store

October 17, 2025 by

Baristas walk the picket line with community supporters at the unionized Starbucks in St. Anthony.

Starbucks has closed its café at 300 Snelling Ave. South in St. Paul, where baristas became the first in Minnesota to win a union election in April 2022.

The closure was part of a corporate restructuring in September that saw about 500 locations shut down.

Union shops, including Starbucks’ flagship coffee house in Seattle, were disproportionately impacted by the closures.

Starbucks Workers United represents over 12,000 baristas at 650 stores, roughly 3% of Starbucks locations in the U.S. Unionized locations made up about 14% of shuttered stores.

Phil Rienstra, who worked in the St. Paul store for two years before it closed, said he and other baristas learned on Thursday, Sept. 25, that the location would shut down for good that weekend.

Phil Rienstra is a former barista at the 300 Snelling store.

“It was sudden, it was callous and it was cruel,” Rienstra said of the abrupt closing. “Months and years of work for the company have been cast aside.”

Starbucks has yet to settle a first contract with any of the bargaining units that began forming at cafés across the country in late 2021. Workers at the St. Paul store briefly negotiated with the company’s representatives, who walked out of the meeting after about five minutes.

Talks shifted away from local bargaining teams in February 2024, when the company and Starbucks Workers United announced they would begin bargaining a national framework contract. The process shifted to mediation earlier this year and has stalled out under the leadership of new CEO Brian Niccol.

Union negotiators were able, however, to win an improved severance package for members impacted by the latest restructuring. In effects bargaining last month, Workers United secured, among other gains, severance pay for union baristas even if they turn down a transfer offer – a guarantee not extended to non-union baristas.

Rienstra said he and other union members were disappointed but not deterred by the closure, and he pledged to keep organizing for a union contract at Starbucks, wherever he ends up next.

Abby Haland says baristas at the St. Anthony Starbucks are ready to strike for a fair first contract.

“This round of layoffs created hundreds of angry but capable people, ready to fight for what they are owed and do whatever it takes to make our union heard,” Rienstra said. “Starbucks does not get to just ignore us.”

To that end, union baristas picketed outside a Starbucks in St. Anthony and in 35 other cities across the country during the week of Sept. 30, giving the company a taste of what could be coming if it doesn’t settle a fair contract soon.

The action in St. Anthony drew about 40 picketers – union members and community supporters – to the Starbucks at 3704 Silver Lake Rd., where they chanted, “no contract, no coffee!” and drew honks of encouragement from passing drivers.

As rush-hour traffic whizzed by, several baristas took the bullhorn to voice their contract demands – like better staffing, more reliable hours and higher pay. Abby Haland, a St. Anthony barista, told the crowd she’s ready to strike for a first contract – and asked for their support.

“Take the pledge, ‘No Contract, No Coffee!’” she said. “And pledge to stand with us on the picket line if we have to go on strike, which we are prepared to do.”

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Seeking ‘strength in numbers,’ Roseville baristas vote to join Starbucks union

March 19, 2025 by

Starbucks workers showed off their union petition outside the Roseville location. (SWU photo)

Baristas at two Starbucks cafés on opposite sides of Highway 36 in Roseville are now part of the same union.

In balloting overseen by the National Labor Relations Board on March 6, workers at the Starbucks south of Highway 36 and Fairview Avenue voted 16-3 to join Starbucks Workers United, which represents over 10,500 workers across the U.S.

Baristas formally requested union representation Feb. 3, less than 2 months after a worker from the Starbucks north of the interchange – unionized since August 2022 – picked up a “borrowed shift” at their café, according to Andraya Skelley, who has five years of experience working for the company.

“He talked to a few of my co-workers that night, and then they brought it to me,” Skelley said. “They were like, ‘Hey, you’re someone who’s been here for a long time. What do you think of us unionizing?’”

Skelley said she and other baristas had previously considered the idea, but momentum “fizzled out” after they watched the company illegally retaliate against the first wave of workers who unionized, withholding their raises, denying them credit-card tips and firing several union organizers.

The company was also slow to engage its workers in contract talks. When Starbucks finally agreed to bargain in 2023, its representatives stonewalled union negotiators in Minnesota and around the country, walking out of over 100 meetings shortly after they began.

But in February 2024, Workers United secured an agreement with Starbucks that expanded credit-card tipping and raises to its unionized locations, and laid out a timetable for negotiations on a framework for bargaining single-store contracts. In January the two sides enlisted the help of a mediator in that process.

Baristas at her Starbucks location, Skelley said, hope their overwhelming vote to join Workers United lends strength to the union in those negotiations.

“There’s strength in numbers,” she said. “The more stores that do unionize, the more Starbucks has to listen. The more the numbers keep going up, it becomes harder and harder to ignore.”

When the time comes to bargain a contract in Roseville, workers hope to address concerns around scheduling and wages. Skelley said that understaffing at the café, particularly during the midday shift or when a team member calls in sick, too often leaves baristas feeling “overextended.”

“I value this job, and I love interacting with the customers,” she said. “On a good day, it feels really good, and I hate how many bad days there’s been lately due to staffing issues. It feels like we don’t have enough support from upper management.”

Not surprisingly, upper managers gave their store plenty of attention in the runup to workers’ union election.

“We had our district manager in all the time; she was really up in our space,” Skelley said. “I wouldn’t say there was super obvious backlash, but it was kind of funny. She would ask if you have any questions, and we were just like, ‘Cool, thanks, I’ll let you know.’”

The newly organized Starbucks in Roseville brings the number unionized cafés in Minnesota up to 13.

Workers at the Starbucks on Snelling and Stanford avenues in St. Paul were the first to win a union election, in April 2022. Other unionized locations include Starbucks in Chanhassen, Duluth, Edina, Fridley, Mall of America, Minneapolis, Moorhead, St. Anthony and St. Cloud, where workers took a vote Feb. 25.

Workers at a 14th Minnesota location, in Sartell, are scheduled to hold a union vote April 7.

– Michael Moore, Union Advocate editor

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Bussin’ baristas take Starbucks union campaign on road

July 10, 2023 by

Starbucks workers launched their bus tour a block from the Capitol in St. Paul.

Set to embark on a nationwide tour to pressure Starbucks into bargaining in good faith with their union, members of Starbucks Workers United rallied today in St. Paul with labor activists, community supporters and U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, who encouraged the baristas to keep up their fight for a union contract.

“I know firsthand the courage it’s taken to do what you’re doing today, and I salute you for it,” said McCollum, who represents Minnesota’s 4th Congressional District.

Workers at over 300 Starbucks locations nationwide, including six in the Twin Cities, have voted to unionize with the Service Employees (SEIU) affiliate since December 2021. None of them has a contract yet.

In Minnesota, bargaining committees from three stores – including the location at 300 Snelling in St. Paul – have held negotiating sessions, but the company’s representatives walked out of each meeting in less than five minutes, according to union members.

Rather than negotiate with its union, Starbucks has cut hours, closed unionized stores and intimidated workers – all textbook union-busting tactics, Wisconsin barista Charles Poulter said.

“It is my opinion that the Starbucks corporation intends to ignore this union to death,” Poulter said during a press conference outside a coach bus emblazoned with union logos and slogans. “They will slash hours until every union partner is forced to move on. And when they bargain with us, they will not bargain in good faith.”

Rep. Betty McCollum encouraged Starbucks workers to keep up their contract campaign.

Their union has appealed – successfully in most cases – to the National Labor Relations Board to force Starbucks to reinstate fired workers, reopen closed stores and bargain in good faith.

Workers United says 19 of 20 decisions handed down by the NLRB have been favorable for the union, with the agency finding Starbucks has committed 194 labor law violations. Another 77 complaints, encompassing over 1,300 alleged violations, are still pending.

But as the NLRB process plays out, union members are hoping to ramp up public pressure on the corporation with a summer road trip, building solidarity among workers at unionized stores, encouraging others to join and calling out members of Starbucks’ board of directors – like Beth Ford, president and CEO of Arden Hills-based Land O’Lakes Inc.

Minneapolis barista Rev Beeby called Workers United’s bus tour a “new, big counteroffensive” in the contract campaign.

“We’re highlighting the victories we’ve had and the new stores that have organized, and we’re going directly to the board of directors and telling them to negotiate,” Beeby said. “Starbucks is scared of us. They know they’re losing, and they know that once we win a strong contract, even more workers will be inspired to join and organize and exercise their power.”

Locally, union baristas have shut down several stores with short-term strikes, protesting unfair labor practices, the company’s failure to bargain and short staffing in their cafes.

Workers at the 300 Snelling location have been on strike five times since forming a union in April 2022. The St. Anthony location saw picketing June 28 in response to allegations that Starbucks banned some LGBTQ Pride Month decorations.

With the bus tour, dubbed “The Union Is Calling,” Starbucks workers plan to extend those worksite actions to a larger public audience.

“By going on tour, these Starbucks workers are raising the stakes and escalating their fight, and Minnesota’s labor movement stands in solidarity with the thousands of Starbucks workers who are fighting for their right to form a union across the country,” St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson said.

After the kickoff event at the Minnesota AFL-CIO’s offices in St. Paul, Starbucks workers traveled to Land O’Lakes headquarters, where they called on Ford to oppose union busting at Starbucks. Later this morning the bus stopped outside two non-union stores, where union members distributed campaign materials.

The bus leaving from St. Paul will wind its way to Buffalo, NY, where workers made history in forming the first union at a corporate-owned store in the U.S. Another bus tour is scheduled to launch later this week on the west coast, with union members traveling to the company’s headquarters in Seattle.

Supporters can follow the tour online.

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St. Paul baristas to Starbucks: ‘We’re not going away’

May 19, 2023 by

Baristas at the Starbucks on Snelling and Stanford avenues in St. Paul went on strike for the fourth time since winning their union election a year ago.

Workers at Minnesota’s first unionized Starbucks store, at Snelling and Stanford avenues in St. Paul, went on strike for a fourth time April 27 – on the one-year anniversary of their historic union election – after management unlawfully removed their union bulletin board.

Workers on the picket line said the bulletin-board stunt is emblematic of Starbucks’ do-nothing approach to labor relations since a wave of successful union drives began sweeping across the country 18 months ago.

Pulling down a union bulletin board isn’t just disrespectful – it’s illegal, too.

But breaking labor law has become the norm for Starbucks’ since the union organizing spree began. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), through its regional offices, has issued over 80 official complaints against Starbucks, alleging over 1,400 charges of unfair labor practices since late 2021. The charges include illegal surveillance of workers, firing union supporters and failing to bargain in good faith.

Workers at Minnesota’s six unionized shops can attest to Starbucks’ failure to bargain.

The company’s representatives walked out of separate meetings with bargaining teams from St. Paul and unionized locations in St. Anthony and Minneapolis after just five minutes – and has refused to meet since.

Workers chalked the union’s logo onto the sidewalk outside the store.

The same scene has played out in over 100 bargaining sessions nationwide, according to Starbucks Workers United.

“Recently, a (district manager) came in to the store, and she asked if I needed anything from her,” barista Graciela Nira said. “I told her I needed some bargaining dates.”

“It’s been a year and we still haven’t had any bargaining sessions that Starbucks has shown up to,” another barista, who requested anonymity, said. “They have refused to release benefits to our store that they’ve released to other stores. They’ve cut down our hours so that we’re extremely short staffed, more so than since I’ve been here. And then they took down our union board.”

The NLRB process is grinding, but Nira, who serves on the union’s national bargaining committee, said she is hopeful it will push Starbucks back to the bargaining table.

Meanwhile, baristas around the country are continuing to organize with Starbucks Workers United, which now represents some 8,000 workers at over 300 U.S. locations.

The national union recently released a list of its contract demands. They include a $20 starting wage, with cost-of-living adjustments for baristas in high-cost areas.

The union also says it will bargain for grievance procedures, employer-paid health insurance with mental-health coverage, consistent schedules, higher staffing levels and more.

On the picket line in St. Paul, workers said staffing is at the top of their concerns. Their bargaining unit had 20 members when workers petitioned for a union election a year ago. Now it’s down to 12.

Nira was one of two baristas who clocked into work at 5 a.m. April 27. Two hours later, as the store was set to open, about 20 co-workers, customers and community supporters showed up in solidarity as they walked off the job.

It was the first strike at the St. Paul location that involved a walkout, and union members said they pulled it together in about 48 hours.

“We just want to sit down and bargain,” Nira added.

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Kera Peterson: Unions are having a resurgence, and every member can be part of it

May 1, 2023 by

St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Kera Peterson is pictured speaking at the 2022 MN AFL-CIO Convention.

At the AFL-CIO Convention last summer, the nation’s largest labor federation set an ambitious goal to bring 1 million new members into our unions over the next 10 years. Since then, the federation has made a strategic investment in creating the Center for Transformational Organizing (CTO), which will bring together a broad coalition of union members to work on movement-wide campaigns related to growing our movement.

The CTO is a key part of a renewed push by our labor federations – at both the national and the local level – to prioritize organizing in all our work. It’s never a bad time to organize in the workplace, but this is an opportunity unlike any we’ve seen in decades. Gallup polling last year found 71% of Americans approve of labor unions, the highest mark since 1965. A separate survey found 70% of “skilled and hourly workers” would join a union if given the opportunity. And broad majorities agree that the decline in union participation has been bad for working people. That’s a big reason why we recently saw Michigan become the first state ever to repeal its ‘right-to-work’ law.

Momentum is on our side. It’s critical that we, as a labor movement, take advantage of this moment and build worker power at scale. That means passing the PRO Act, which will restore workers’ right to join together and form a union – free from harassment and intimidation – and to bargain better wages, benefits and working conditions. The PRO Act would finally put teeth into our nation’s labor laws, stiffening penalties on bosses who threaten, retaliate against or fire workers who exercise their right to collective action. We’re taking action here in Minnesota, too, by lobbying in support of legislation that would ban captive audience meetings, in which bosses force their workers to listen to anti-union speech, intimidation and, too often, outright lies.

Even with the deck stacked against them, many Americans have succeeded in organizing their workplace in recent years, seizing this moment of labor resurgence to lock down a more powerful voice over their working conditions. Last month, baristas at a Starbucks in Sacramento became the 300th store to unionize with Workers United, and ice-cream scoopers at Ben & Jerry’s flagship store in Vermont announced their plans to form a union, “Scoopers United.” Bookstore clerks, craft beverage workers, and museum staff are also successfully organizing in sectors of the economy where unions have not traditionally had a presence.

Elsewhere, unions are organizing to increase workers’ representation and raise standards in industries like health care, construction and arts and entertainment. Over 2,000 Twin Cities health care workers have joined unions since 2001. Building Trades unions continue to shine a light on wage theft and other labor abuses that happen too frequently on local multifamily residential construction sites. And 45,000 workers at Delta Air Lines, which maintains a hub of operations at Minneapolis-St. Paul Airport, are engaged in the world’s largest private-sector union drive at any single company. That campaign held a rally here last month, which the Saint Paul Regional Labor Federation was proud to host at our union hall.

Our union family is positioned well for historic growth, but it won’t happen without all of us pulling together in solidarity. It won’t happen unless those of us doing our movement’s work on the local level take on the AFL-CIO’s challenge to put organizing at the center of all our work. That could mean talking to friends and family about the union advantage – higher wages, job security and better health and retirement benefits – or talking to your elected officials about the importance of strengthening labor laws. It also could mean showing up in solidarity with workers in an organizing or contract campaign. We’re posting updates and opportunities regularly on the Regional Labor Federation’s Facebook page. We all can play a part in this historic union resurgence. Together, we can meet the moment and revitalize our movement.

– Kera Peterson is president of the Saint Paul Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO. Learn more about the SPRLF and its work at stpaulunions.org.

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St. Paul Starbucks workers win union election

April 27, 2022 by

Starbucks workers supporting the union drive at the Snelling and Stanford location include (L to R) Max Chang, Colton Johnson, Sohyeon Yun, Graciela Nira, Asusena Barragan, Lola Rubens and Sitra Abdulkadir.

Baristas in St. Paul won their union election today, giving Minnesota its first corporate-owned, unionized Starbucks.

In an election overseen by the National Labor Relations Board, workers at Starbucks’ 300 Snelling Ave. location voted 14-1 in favor of joining Workers United, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

The NLRB tallied votes, which workers cast by mail earlier this month, in Minneapolis today. Workers and representatives of the company were able to watch a live video stream of the tally, said pro-union barista Lola Rubens, who tuned in from the cafe before her shift began.

“My heart was pounding,” she said. “I probably looked like a fool in the cafe because every time they would show a yes vote, I would do a little dance.

“There’s so much joy in this moment, and I’m so excited that we did this and so excited for all the things that are to come. We have the opportunity to take part in creating a contract that reflects us, the people who work here. It’s an amazing feeling that now we have that say.”

Rubens and other Twin Cities baristas have said they want to bargain for higher wages, better training opportunities and more support for employees from marginalized communities.

Workers at four other Twin Cities Starbucks have filed for union elections. The NLRB will tally votes cast by workers at the Starbucks located at 4712 Cedar Ave. in Minneapolis next Monday.

“We are hopefully the first of many stores in Minnesota who are going to succeed in unionizing,” Rubens said. “There are just stores filing left and right, and I hope that our victory is going to give them more momentum.”

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Twin Cities Starbucks workers join union wave

February 11, 2022 by

Starbucks workers supporting the union drive at the Snelling and Stanford location include (L to R) Max Chang, Colton Johnson, Sohyeon Yun, Graciela Nira, Asusena Barragan, Lola Rubens and Sitra Abdulkadir.

Workers at two Starbucks locations in the Twin Cities today announced they are forming unions, becoming the first Minnesotans to join a nationwide surge of worker organizing at the world’s largest coffeehouse chain.

In letters emailed to Starbucks CEO Kevin Johnson and hand-delivered to their store managers this morning, baristas at 300 Snelling Avenue in St. Paul and 4712 Cedar Avenue in Minneapolis demanded recognition of their bargaining units.

“We are organizing a union at the Snelling and Stanford store in Saint Paul to improve our workplace for ourselves, for members of our community, and for Starbucks as a whole,” St. Paul workers wrote.

An “overwhelming majority” of employees at each location signed cards requesting union representation, according to the union behind the Starbucks organizing campaign, Workers United. It petitioned the National Labor Relations Board today for union elections at the two Twin Cities stores.

Workers United has filed for elections at over 70 Starbucks locations nationwide in recent months. That includes the Elmwood Village café in Buffalo, N.Y., where workers succeeded in forming the first union at a corporate-owned Starbucks in the U.S.

Organizing efforts moved quickly in the St. Paul and Minneapolis Starbucks, which employ about 50 workers combined.

Lola Rubens, a barista at the Snelling location, said she and her co-workers pulled together enough signatures to file for an election in just one week. They pushed the pace, she said, in part to show solidarity with seven union supporters fired by Starbucks in Memphis Tuesday.

“The message we’re trying to send, in general, to other Starbucks workers in Memphis and Buffalo is that we’re behind them, that we support them,” Rubens said. “Nobody is in this alone anymore.”

Rubens and other Twin Cities baristas said they want to bargain for higher wages, better training opportunities and more support for employees from marginalized communities.

Most of all, Starbucks workers want a seat at the table in decisions that affect their working conditions, said Kasey Copeland, a barista at the Cedar Avenue coffeehouse. For many baristas, she added, the company’s approach during the pandemic did not seem to prioritize their health and safety.

“We really feel like a lot of the policies and procedures in place, they don’t take our perspective into account,” said Copeland, who has three years of experience with the company. “We really want to make Starbucks the best possible place it can be. We want it to live up to the mission and values they put forward, but it’s impossible for them to do that without our eyes on the ground.”

Starbucks’ values have come under scrutiny since workers in Buffalo took their union drive public last fall.

Despite its reputation as a progressive corporation, Starbucks executives unleashed an aggressive campaign to pressure Buffalo workers into voting down union representation. And the firings in Memphis suggest the company’s tactics are escalating as the union wave spreads.

“It’s just so disappointing,” Copeland said of Starbucks’ union busting. “While I didn’t necessarily expect better, I did hope for better. It’s going to be very interesting to see how long they can get away with that without losing support from their customers.”

Still, workers in the Twin Cities have the benefit of knowing what to expect in the coming weeks.

Copeland said she anticipates a parade of “district and regional managers coming into our stores and looking over our shoulders.” Rubens said she and her co-workers have already begun preparing a response, with support from Workers United, to the pressure tactics and talking points executives are likely to use in captive-audience meetings.

“We are very fortunate that there have been workers at many stores who have paved the way for us,” Rubens said. “Starbucks still believes they can throw more money and lawyers at this to make it go away. The amount of money they’re willing to put behind this is shocking.”

The anti-union campaign may be coming, but today workers were intent on celebrating some history in the making. They hope it’s just the start of bigger things to come.

“I think what we did will really get the ball rolling in Minneapolis,” Copeland said. “This is becoming a significant movement, and it will mean a lot not just for Starbucks employees, but for baristas and essential workers everywhere.”

“It’s going to be hard, but I hope no one is letting it get in the way of their joy and excitement,” Rubens added. “This is a joyous time for us, a time to speak our minds and advocate for ourselves, and Starbucks can’t take that away from us, no matter how hard they might try.”

Workers United is an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union. Starbucks workers in the Twin Cities are organizing with support from the union’s Chicago and Midwest Regional Joint Board.

Workers United representative Esau Chavez urged other Starbucks workers interested forming a union to email sbworkersunited@gmail.com, and to follow the campaign on social media, including @SBWorkersUnited on Twitter.

As for members of the community, placing an order at the Cedar or Snelling stores under the name “Union Yes” is a “great way to show support for these workers,” Chavez said.

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