5 Louisville area Starbucks locations on strike as part of nationwide 'Red Cup Rebellion Day'

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Union workers at five Starbucks locations in the Louisville area have joined workers across the country that went on strike as part of "Red Cup Rebellion Day."

Union workers at the Starbucks stores on Baxter Avenue, Factory Lane, and South 3rd Street in Louisville either stayed home or walked off the job Thursday morning because they said Starbucks is "illegally refusing to bargain with baristas over staffing, scheduling and other issues."

Workers at the Starbucks on The Loop in Elizabethtown and on Veterans Parkway in Clarksville also took part in the strike. Employees from several Louisville area stores staged a strike last year on Red Cup Day as well.

Starbucks workers form picket line at Louisville's Factory Lane location — This image taken from video dated Nov. 17, 2022, shows Starbucks employees picketing at the Starbucks at 12911 Factory Lane in Louisville, Ky., protesting working conditions and calling for company officials to come to the bargaining table. (WDRB photo)

Nov. 16 is Starbucks' popular "Red Cup Day," which is one of the busiest days of the year. That's the day the chain gives away thousands of limited edition, reusable red cups to customers who order a holiday drink.

Thousands of workers at more than 200 U.S. Starbucks stores were expected to take part in what organizers say is the largest strike yet in the two-year-old effort to unionize the company’s stores.

According to a written statement from Starbucks Workers United, the Red Cup promotion and others like half-off ThursYays and Buy One Get One Free offers draw large crowds that can overwhelm staff.

"On Red Cup Day, drink orders pile up and are abandoned, lines are out the door, and Starbucks workers are left to handle angry customers who have had to wait as much longer than usual for their beverages and food all while trying to make complicated holiday specialty beverages as fast as possible. When the supply of red cups runs out, customers get disappointed and often take their anger out on workers."

As part of the strike, workers are demanding Starbucks turn off mobile ordering on future promotion days. In a written statement, a worker from the Factory Lane Starbucks who wishes to remain anonymous, said:

"It isn't about me, it is about all of us. Every benefit the company has given since last Red Cup Day has been because of stores striking and demanding better. And now we have more stores on strike than ever before because they see the changes that are happening, and that it is because of the unionized baristas organizing and demanding change. It has been 1 year since the first stores went on strike. We won't stop until we get our contract."

Starbucks Workers United has said the company refuses to bargain over staffing and other issues, but Starbucks officials said the union hasn't agreed to meet in more than four months.

The strike is taking place at other unionized Starbucks stores across the country as well, but so far the strikes have had little impact on the company's sales, according to a report from the Associated Press. For its 2023 fiscal year, which ended Oct. 1, Starbucks reported its revenue rose 12%, to a record $36.0 billion.

As a show of support, several University of Louisville students planned to show up with signs and banners outside Starbucks located in the student activities center on the Belknap campus.

Starbucks downplayed any potential impact of the strike Wednesday, saying it would occur at a "small subset" of the company's 9,600 company-owned U.S. stores.

"We remain committed to working with all partners, side-by-side, to elevate the everyday, and we hope that Workers United’s priorities will shift to include the shared success of our partners and negotiating contracts for those they represent," Starbucks said in a statement.

At least 363 company-operated Starbucks stores in 41 states have voted to unionize since late 2021. Louisville's Baxter Avenue location was the latest to join the union, and the fourth in metro Louisville to vote to unionize. The Clarksville location was the first in Indiana to unionize.

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