Employees at a Starbucks in Mesa voted Friday to form a union, becoming the first store outside New York to organize.
Several workers from a Mesa Starbucks store cheered and hugged at a local union hall after the results came in. Workers were overwhelmingly in favor of unionizing, voting 25-3. Forty-three ballots in total were initially mailed out, organizers said.
Tyler Ralston, another shift supervisor, said he is excited that workers now may be able to make meaningful changes. The Seattle-based coffee giant argued that a single store should not be allowed to hold a vote. Instead, a vote should include all the locations in that store’s assigned district.The organizers in Mesa called the request a "union busting" tactic by the company, Alanna said. She also alleged Starbucks implemented other strategies like having upper-level managers shadow workers to make sure they weren’t organizing.
Employees countered that Starbucks was retaliating and said they planned to file a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board. "I think the fact of how it is scary is part of why we need to do this. With a union, you don’t have to be scared. Without a union, you are entirely at the mercy of whatever company you work for. They have the final say, they have the first say, so it’s impossible not to be terrified when they have all the power," said Isaac Feilbach, a Starbucks barista at 7th Street and Bell Road.
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