Posts tagged SBWU
After months-long barista strike, Starbucks to resume bargaining with SBWU union
March 26, 2026 // Over 14,000 unionized baristas are demanding higher pay, better staffing and for Starbucks to resolve over 600 unfair labor practice charges that SBWU has filed with the National Labor Relations Board. The union has dialed back its pay increase demands since going on strike over four months ago. It’s now asking for a minimum hourly wage of $17 per hour, down from $20 per hour in November, and 4% annual pay raises, instead of 5%.
NY Starbucks Barista Asks Federal Labor Board to Restore Employees’ Right to Vote Out SBWU Union Officials
September 14, 2025 // SBWU union bosses prevented worker-requested union removal vote by filing unverified charges, never demonstrated link to worker effort. Starbucks barista Nadia Kuban is asking the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in Washington, DC, to overturn federal policies that are preventing her colleagues from having a vote to remove unwanted Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) union officials from their workplace. Kuban is receiving free legal aid from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation.
Federal Appeals Court Hears Arguments in Starbucks Baristas’ First-In-The-Nation Suit Challenging Constitutionality of NLRB
May 16, 2025 // Cortes and Karam’s case, originally filed in 2023, was the first in the nation to advance the argument that NLRB board members’ removal protections – which insulate members of the federal labor board from accountability to the President except on very rare occasions – violate separation of powers doctrines in Article II of the Constitution. Since Foundation attorneys filed the baristas’ case, the Trump Administration advanced the same arguments to remove Biden NLRB Member Gwynne Wilcox from the Board, which is now the subject of ongoing litigation.
Starbucks Employee’s Constitutional Challenge to Labor Board Structure Fully Briefed at DC Circuit Court of Appeals
February 25, 2025 // On April 28, 2023, Cortes submitted a petition, supported by a majority of her colleagues, asking the NLRB to hold a decertification election at her Buffalo-area “Del-Chip” Starbucks store to remove Starbucks Workers United (SBWU) union officials’ bargaining powers over workers. However, NLRB Region 3 rejected Cortes’ petition, citing unfair labor practice accusations made by SBWU union officials against the Starbucks Corporation. Notably, there was no established link between these allegations and the employees’ decertification request. Similarly, Karam filed a decertification petition seeking a vote to remove the union at his Buffalo-area Starbucks store. Like Cortes’ petition, NLRB officials refuse to allow the vote to take place, citing claims made by SBWU officials. As a result the workers remain trapped under union “representation” they oppose.
Starbucks Barista Asks Labor Board to Overturn Regional Official’s Decision to Continue Blocking Vote to Remove Union
November 21, 2024 // Smith’s appeal challenges the regional NLRB’s refusal to reinstate her decertification petition, which it is still stonewalling despite the resolution of SBWU union officials’ charges against Starbucks that were ostensibly the justification for blocking the workers’ petition for a vote to remove the union. Smith argues that the decision is inconsistent not only with the Board’s past reasons for holding up the petition, but also with workers’ right under federal labor law to promptly have an election to remove a union they do not want.
Albany Starbucks Employees Seek Vote to Kick Out SBWU Union
March 1, 2024 // Dowey and her colleagues join Starbucks partners and other coffee company employees across the country in banding together to vote out SBWU union officials. In the past year, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY; two Buffalo, NY locations; Pittsburgh, PA; Bloomington, MN; Salt Lake City, UT; Greenville, SC; Oklahoma City, OK; San Antonio, TX; and Philadelphia, PA, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in filing or defending decertification petitions at the NLRB. Foundation attorneys have helped employees at independent Philadelphia coffee shops Good Karma Café and Ultimo Coffee successfully oust Workers United union officials, who are affiliated with SBWU. Many employees of Starbucks or other coffee establishments are requesting decertification votes from the NLRB roughly one year after union bosses attained power in their workplaces, which is the earliest opportunity afforded by federal law to do so.
Texas Starbucks Employee Challenges Federal Labor Board Structure as Unconstitutional in New Federal Lawsuit
January 24, 2024 // Busler submitted his union decertification petition on November 16, 2023. The petition contained signatures from enough of his coworkers to trigger a vote to remove the union under NLRB rules. However, the NLRB Regional Director still blocked the vote based on unfair labor practice charges SBWU union officials filed against Starbucks, despite there being no proven connection between those allegations and Busler’s decertification petition. The NLRB’s refusal to hold a union decertification vote means that Busler and his coworkers are still trapped under the “representation” of the SBWU union, despite numerous reports of SBWU agents’ combative and abrasive behavior at the store. In other filings in the NLRB case, Busler and his colleagues reported that SBWU officials ordered a divisive strike in which “[union] supporters outside the store were loud, boisterous, and were screaming at customers” and “would sometimes yell at other employees or tell partners that if they did not support Workers United they would be personally ostracized by other partners.” “Moreover, I believe the other employees who signed my decertification petition did not do so because they were coerced or duped by anything Starbucks allegedly did wrong, but because the Union was a divisive force in our store and has now ignored our location for several months,” Busler stated in an NLRB filing.
Philadelphia Ultimo Coffee Workers Win Bid to Remove So-Called “Workers United” Union
January 9, 2024 // Ultimo employees are third recent group of coffee shop workers in Philly to kick out an unwanted union, as Center City Starbucks workers await vote to remove SBWU Tarasenko and his colleagues join Starbucks workers and other coffee employees across the country in banding together to vote out WU union officials, who have targeted coffee shops nationwide for unionization. This year, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY; two Buffalo, NY locations; Pittsburgh, PA; Bloomington, MN; Salt Lake City, UT; Greenville, SC; Oklahoma City, OK; and San Antonio, TX, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in filing or defending decertification petitions at the NLRB.
Philadelphia Starbucks Workers File Petition Demanding Vote to Remove SBWU Union
November 9, 2023 // Simonelli and his colleagues join Starbucks workers and other coffee employees across the country in banding together to vote out SBWU union officials. This year, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY; two Buffalo, NY locations; Pittsburgh, PA; Bloomington, MN; Salt Lake City, UT; Greenville, SC; and Oklahoma City, OK, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in filing or defending decertification petitions at the NLRB. In Philadelphia, workers at Good Karma Café, an independent coffee shop in Philadelphia, successfully voted out the SBWU union in September with Foundation help. This growing wave of decertification attempts is occurring after SBWU union agents engaged in a multi-year, aggressive unionization campaign against Starbucks employees. As part of the campaign, SBWU spent over $2 million to target the coffee chain with paid union agents – including “salts” who obtained jobs at Starbucks locations with the covert mission of installing union power. After achieving this goal, many “salts” abandoned the stores. Many workers targeted by this campaign are demanding decertification votes roughly one year after an SBWU union was installed at their store, which is the earliest possible opportunity afforded by federal law to do so.
Oklahoma City Starbucks Employees Latest to Demand Vote to Remove SBWU Union from Workplace
October 11, 2023 // Smith and her coworkers’ effort is the latest in a chain of SBWU decertification pushes across the country. Since May, Starbucks employees in Manhattan, NY; Buffalo, NY; Pittsburgh, PA; Bloomington, MN; Salt Lake City, UT; and Greenville, SC, have all sought free Foundation legal aid in pursuing their decertification petitions at the NLRB. Last month, workers at Good Karma Café, an independent coffee shop in Philadelphia, successfully voted out the SBWU union with Foundation help. The flurry of decertification attempts is occurring roughly one year after SBWU union agents engaged in an aggressive unionization campaign against Starbucks employees. Federal labor law forbids workers from decertifying a union for a year after its installation, meaning many workers are seizing on the earliest possible opportunity to rid themselves of the SBWU union’s “representation.”