Workers at sixth St. Louis-area Starbucks location file for union election

Workers at the Starbucks location at Hwy. 141 and I-44 (922 South Meramec Station Road, Valley Park) have filed for a union election with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), joining five other St. Louis-area locations seeking union elections.

The caffeinated wave of Starbucks baristas seeking to unionize here and around the country started in December when Starbucks workers in upstate New York made history by becoming the first in the company to unionize.

Just four months later, there are now 25 unionized Starbucks locations and over 200 that have filed union elections petitions with the National Labor Relations Board.

‘ASSAULTED’ BY UNIONS
This string of union victories flies in the face of the company’s relentless union-busting campaign. Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz went so far as to state that Starbucks and other companies throughout the country are “being assaulted in many ways by the threat of unionization.”

Despite the all-out war by management to quash the union effort, workers have remained strong and united. That solidarity is showing results. In one day alone, they won five elections in the “right-to-work (for less)” state of Virginia.

ORDER THAT LATTE UNION STRONG
That doesn’t mean you have to kick your Starbucks coffee habit.

The AFL-CIO is asking anyone who uses the Starbucks mobile app to order coffee to use a pro-union message such as “Union Strong” or “Union Yes” as their name to show support for Starbucks workers seeking to unionize, and to encourage employees at other local stores to organize.

(Information from Workers United-SEIU and Labor 411.)