Mamdani says he ‘won’t be buying any Starbucks’ while baristas remain on strike
New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani publicly announced he is boycotting Starbucks and asking others to join him while baristas across the country continue their open-ended strike.
Mamdani made his stance clear on Nov. 14 in a post on X.
"Starbucks workers across the country are on an Unfair Labor Practices strike, fighting for a fair contract," he said. "While workers are on strike, I won't be buying any Starbucks, and I'm asking you to join us."
In another X post, Mamdani shared a picture with Sen. Elizabeth Warren and former FTC Commissioner Lina Khan, a member of his transition team, which was captioned, "In the fight for working people, you find good company."
Warren has also expressed her support for the Starbucks baristas' strike in an X post .
"While the Starbucks CEO rolls around in his millions, the workers who actually make your coffee are struggling to get by," Warren wrote. "Workers at world's largest coffee chain deserve a fair contract."
The nationwide strike began around the time Starbucks brought back its reusable red cups for the holiday season to protest "Starbucks' historic union busting and failure to finalize a fair union contract," the company's union said in a statement .
The open-ended strike began on Thursday with 65 stores across more than 40 cities and comes after six months of Starbucks refusing to offer the following new proposals to address workers' demands:
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Better hours to improve staffing in stores
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Higher take-home pay
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Resolution for hundreds of outstanding fair labor practice charges for union busting
The union states that baristas across more than 550 union stores are prepared to help make this the longest strike in company history if their demands are not met.
"If Starbucks keeps stonewalling a fair contract and refusing to end union-busting, they'll see their business grind to a halt," said Michelle Eisen, Starbucks Workers United spokesperson and 15-year veteran barista, in the press release. "No contract, no coffee is more than a tagline — it's a pledge to interrupt Starbucks' operations and profits until a fair union contract and an end to unfair labor practices are won. Starbucks knows where we stand."
Starbucks responds
Jaci Anderson, Starbucks director of global communications, shared the following statement with MassLive:
"In terms of our annual Reusable Red Cup Day — we actually had a great day — 99% of our coffeehouses remained open and welcoming customers and we exceeded our sales expectations across company-operated coffeehouses in North America, making it the best Red Cup Day ever.
"We're disappointed that Workers United, who represents less than 4% of our partners, has called for a strike instead of returning to the bargaining table. Less than 1% of our coffeehouses are experiencing any level of disruption and the vast majority of our 240,000 partners came to work ready to serve customers and celebrate Reuseable Red Cup Day.
"We've been very clear — when the union is ready to come back to the bargaining table, we're ready to talk. The facts show people like working at Starbucks. Partner engagement is up, turnover is nearly half the industry average, and we get more than 1 million job applications a year.
"Any agreement needs to reflect the reality that Starbucks offers the best job in retail, including more than $30 an hour on average in pay and benefits for hourly partners."
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