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Speaker 1: Welcome Today, could happen here a podcast about fighting your bosses? Uh?

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Speaker 1: This is this is your host Christopher Wong and with

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Speaker 1: me today to talk about fighting bosses and bosses doing

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Speaker 1: incredibly illegal stuff, bosses doing incredibly shady stuff, and why

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Speaker 1: you should fight them more is Tori Tampolini, who was

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Speaker 1: a partner organizer from Pittsburgh Starbucks Workers United and was

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Speaker 1: fired from Starbucks like very illegally, under very sketchy circumstances. Tory,

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Speaker 1: Welcome to the show. Thanks so much. I'm excited to

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Speaker 1: be here. Yeah, I'm really really happy to have you here. Um, Okay,

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Speaker 1: So I guess I guess we should start with the

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Speaker 1: whole you were denied you were you were, you were

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Speaker 1: denied your legal rights and then fired presumably for union

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Speaker 1: organizing thing. Yes, absolutely, so starting from the beginning. And

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Speaker 1: there was like I was so a month ago my

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Speaker 1: store manager set me down and I like, he asked

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Speaker 1: me to come downstairs for a conversation. So I brought

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Speaker 1: a witness with me and we went downstairs, and I

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Speaker 1: found out that I was being investigated because there was

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Speaker 1: one day that I had written down my weekday start

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Speaker 1: time instead of my weekend to start time. They just

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Speaker 1: recently changed things at my store so that we opened

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Speaker 1: at we start opening shifts at five thirty on the

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Speaker 1: weekends and five on the weekdays. And this is a

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Speaker 1: recent change up. I had been there for three years,

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Speaker 1: so I out of habit. One day I had written

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Speaker 1: five in the book instead of five thirty. Um. A

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Speaker 1: couple of months later, it seems like everything has blown over.

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Speaker 1: They accepted the fact that it was just an innocent mistake.

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Speaker 1: I really wasn't trying to steal thirty minutes of time,

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Speaker 1: which comes out to like what six dollars after Like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I was really desperate for that six dollars. So I

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Speaker 1: figured they just they knew it was an innocent mistake

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Speaker 1: and it wasn't going to be a further issue until

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Speaker 1: I saw two managers in my store. One of them

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Speaker 1: was my store manager, the other one was Her name

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Speaker 1: is Brittany. And what Starbucks has done recently is that

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Speaker 1: they've created this new position in the company. From my understanding,

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Speaker 1: it's called support manager, and they're basically like an assistant

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Speaker 1: district manager, and they go around two stores where there's

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Speaker 1: any sort of union activity, and they try to talk

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Speaker 1: about strategies to squash it. So it's like, basically the

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Speaker 1: store manager that did the most harsh union busting if

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Speaker 1: their own store gets promoted to this position. So in

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Speaker 1: my district, the person's name is Brittany, and I saw

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Speaker 1: her in my store, which is always a bad sign.

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Speaker 1: And um, at one point they asked me to have

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Speaker 1: a seat for a conversation. So I sit down, and uh, well,

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Speaker 1: before I sit down, I say, is this a disciplinary conversation?

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Speaker 1: And the manager said the one manager said to me, yes,

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Speaker 1: this is solely a disciplinary conversation. And I said, I

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Speaker 1: would like to invoke my wine button rights. I'm going

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Speaker 1: to go out to the floor and bring somebody back

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Speaker 1: as a witness. And they said, you can't do that today.

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Speaker 1: And basically what they did is they like held up

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Speaker 1: a piece of paper like with a wall of text

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Speaker 1: on it like this are from my face, and they're

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Speaker 1: like it says right here that we can't. We don't

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Speaker 1: have to do that for you. And I was like

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Speaker 1: that's really illegal and I'm not comfortable having this conversation

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Speaker 1: right now at all. And they said, well, we're going

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Speaker 1: to hand this to you anyway, and handed me a

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Speaker 1: notice of termination. Um. Yeah, so I walked out and

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Speaker 1: walk back to the front of house, and I said

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Speaker 1: a little bit loudly, definitely not like shouting, but kind

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Speaker 1: of loudly. I said, I just got fired, and is

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Speaker 1: it okay if I swear to quote my friend? Okay? Cool.

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Speaker 1: So my best friend Kim was working at the time,

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Speaker 1: and she loudly said, right in front of our new

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Speaker 1: store manager, what the fuck? And I just kept walking

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Speaker 1: because I was so upset and I didn't want the

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Speaker 1: managers to see me cry. So I walked to the

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Speaker 1: front of house, or walk outside, and Kim follows me,

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Speaker 1: and she was like, we're gonna fix this. I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: go ask Pulieve Early and I'll drive you home and

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Speaker 1: we'll talk about this. Kim goes back inside, looks at

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Speaker 1: my assistant manager and says, I'm a question mission to

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Speaker 1: be leieve Early. And the assistant manager literally couldn't even

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Speaker 1: look her in the eye and told her Kim go

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Speaker 1: have a seat in the back, and they fired Kim

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Speaker 1: as well. Jesus, yeah, yeah. And I think when everything

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Speaker 1: about the story that I think is worth talking about

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Speaker 1: is that like when when it comes to union busting,

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Speaker 1: it literally does not matter how good of an employee,

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Speaker 1: you are unblessed, like you not being there will literally

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Speaker 1: cause everything to collapse. But yeah, I don't talk about

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Speaker 1: like you were really good at this, and they were

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Speaker 1: still just like no, fuck you. Yeah. So I was

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Speaker 1: voted by everybody at my store. I was voted Partner

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Speaker 1: of the Quarter in spring of I was also promoted

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Speaker 1: a shift supervisor within that same week. And later that year,

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Speaker 1: I participated in a Barista competition for my store and

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Speaker 1: I won Barista Champion for my store level, and I

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Speaker 1: also tied at the district level for Barisa Champion for

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Speaker 1: the district. So um. And then in addition to that,

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Speaker 1: I had dealt with a situation where somebody like leaning

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Speaker 1: against the front of my store had overdosed on heroin

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Speaker 1: and I gave him an arcan and basically saved the

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Speaker 1: guy's life. And then like a month or two later

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Speaker 1: they fired me. So yeah, which I like, I'm trying

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Speaker 1: to think of if like any other way you can

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Speaker 1: possibly go like above and beyond what anyone could reasonably

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Speaker 1: require you, that is more than I saved a dude's life.

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Speaker 1: It's like, okay, like you're welcome, guys, someone would have

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Speaker 1: died inside your store if I wasn't there, but um, okay,

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Speaker 1: by I guess yeah, And I wanted to talk a

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Speaker 1: little bit about about that, specifically, in about sort of

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Speaker 1: the conditions at the store, because one of the things

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Speaker 1: that seems really clear from from listening to you talk

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Speaker 1: about it and from reading stuff about it is that

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Speaker 1: it's not just I mean, even if you were just

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Speaker 1: like you know, doing kind of regular issue like service

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Speaker 1: workers stuff, this would be unccessible. But it's also like

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Speaker 1: there's there's this way in which you and your co

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Speaker 1: workers have sort of been turned into social workers and

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Speaker 1: are being sort of are being forced to like deal

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Speaker 1: with just all of the people who sort of capitalism

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Speaker 1: to say, I just like spat out absolutely yeah, and

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Speaker 1: sort of like fill in the gaps of just the

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Speaker 1: collapse of American social services. And yeah, I wanted, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I wondered if you could talk a little bit about

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Speaker 1: the stuff that you've been having to do and what

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Speaker 1: that's like. Yeah. Absolutely, So. Something I've noticed in Market

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Speaker 1: Square is that it feels like there were some sort

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Speaker 1: of resources for the unhoused community that existed before the

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Speaker 1: pandemic that's straight up just don't exist anymore. So A

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Speaker 1: lot of that that work to be done, like falls

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Speaker 1: on the Starbucks employees. Most of us are completely unqualified

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Speaker 1: for that, Like I have a degree in psychology, but

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Speaker 1: sometimes that's just not really enough. Most of us are

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Speaker 1: film students at Point Park, so none of us are

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Speaker 1: at all equipped to deal with any situations where somebody

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Speaker 1: is under the influence of something and maybe becoming aggressive,

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Speaker 1: or somebody is having a mental health crisis, or there

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Speaker 1: are people that are sleeping in the cafe and we're

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Speaker 1: asked to pick them out if they're sleeping, but that

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Speaker 1: feels really really bad because there's not a ton of

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Speaker 1: other resources, especially during the day, I know, the shelters closed,

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Speaker 1: so when it's like winter or it's like ninety degrees

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Speaker 1: outside and someone is just trying to get like a

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Speaker 1: tiny little bit of sleep, it feels really bad to

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Speaker 1: kick them out. Um, So we dealt with a lot

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Speaker 1: of situations that we are just completely on equipped to handle.

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Speaker 1: And Starbucks would send us de escalation training, but most

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Speaker 1: of the de escalation training revolved around if a customer

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Speaker 1: isn't happy with their drink and they're shouting at you,

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Speaker 1: So it doesn't even begin to cover like any of

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Speaker 1: the stuff that we deal with that Market Square we

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Speaker 1: had like we've we've seen a lot of customers having

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Speaker 1: mental health crises in the cafe, Like what do you do?

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Speaker 1: Like I don't want to call the police. That's definitely

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Speaker 1: not going to help. UM. In the situation where I

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Speaker 1: had to narcan somebody the we had called for an

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Speaker 1: ambulance and twenty minutes later, the ambulance still wasn't there,

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Speaker 1: And there were even managers at the surrounding businesses calling

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Speaker 1: and calling and calling trying to get an ambulance to

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Speaker 1: Market Square and it ended up like being me that

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Speaker 1: had to give them a narcan. UM overall, like something

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Speaker 1: that we were pushing for with Union. The main thing

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Speaker 1: that we were pushing for was better training, Like we

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Speaker 1: want Narcan to keep in the stores and we want

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Speaker 1: all the ships to be trained on how to use that.

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Speaker 1: And that doesn't have to be through Starbucks. There are

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Speaker 1: I know of a lot of organizations throughout Picksburg that

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Speaker 1: would be happy to train our staff on that. UM

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Speaker 1: we need like better resources. I know at one point

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Speaker 1: we were falsely promised a social worker that would sit

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Speaker 1: in our cafe for at least one day every two weeks.

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Speaker 1: UM never got that, And yeah, I feel like my

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Speaker 1: staff just deserves better, the community deserves better, and it

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Speaker 1: shouldn't be Starbucks's job. But until we have something better,

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Speaker 1: I think that we should be a little bit more

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Speaker 1: equipped to handle situation that, frankly, we do have to

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Speaker 1: deal with at some point, just by the nature of

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Speaker 1: our work and our location. I also think something really

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Speaker 1: funny to mention here is that we got a new

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Speaker 1: store manager at the UM. I want to say, at

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Speaker 1: the beginning, or like mid June, we got this new

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Speaker 1: store manager. Her name was Sarah, and she has already

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Speaker 1: transferred to a different store because she felt so unsafe

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Speaker 1: working up Market Square. She got her first Market Square

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Speaker 1: a death threat and was like, I'm out. So even

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Speaker 1: the store manager can't deny that our working positions are bad.

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Speaker 1: So the fact that they're still fighting against the union

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Speaker 1: even though management is well aware of how terrible our

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Speaker 1: conditions are. Just like baffles. Yeah, okay, I want to

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Speaker 1: I want to take a second and go back to

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Speaker 1: something that you said, which is your first Market Square

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Speaker 1: death threat? How common is this? UM? I think I

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Speaker 1: received a total of four to five and UM, then

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Speaker 1: I received my very last one. The day that my

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Speaker 1: store went on strike and I was standing at the

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Speaker 1: picket line and I was like, wow, it's just like

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Speaker 1: the good old days before. But yeah, market squares a

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Speaker 1: lotless land. Yeah, And I like, I don't know, like

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Speaker 1: I feel like this is like every time I do

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Speaker 1: this is like a recurring thing. Every time I do

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Speaker 1: a labor story, it's like, oh, this is a labor storce,

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Speaker 1: Like no, but it's also the story of a bunch

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Speaker 1: of like a bunch of people whose job this like

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Speaker 1: isn't who just wind up having to deal with all

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Speaker 1: of the ship that the state doesn't want to do,

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Speaker 1: that corporations don't want to do. And it's like the

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Speaker 1: the fact that Starbucks employees have to be the like

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Speaker 1: the Starbucks union has to be the group in like

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Speaker 1: in this place that is trying to get people to

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Speaker 1: get in dark hand training is nuts. Like just just

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Speaker 1: like just any like sort of just Macro taking a

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Speaker 1: step back level, like what on earth is going on

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Speaker 1: in the society. CAN have been thinking a lot about lately,

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Speaker 1: Like I think a lot of journalists and reporters have

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Speaker 1: asked me, like, why do you think that the younger

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Speaker 1: generation is the one like leading this like why are

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Speaker 1: unions making it back now? And why is his younger

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Speaker 1: generations like so ready to lead this? And I think

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Speaker 1: it's because we've spent our entire lives watching politicians on

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Speaker 1: TV make all these promises and continuing to do absolutely nothing,

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Speaker 1: and we're all sick and tired of it. We are

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Speaker 1: all ready to take it into our own hands and

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Speaker 1: fix it in any way that we see that we had. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: it makes a lot of sense. I mean, like I

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Speaker 1: my you know, my my first ball Okay, so my

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Speaker 1: first political member was the Rock War, but like I

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Speaker 1: was like a little baby child, but like like you know,

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Speaker 1: like I remember, like the thing I grew up on

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Speaker 1: was like yeah it was Obama, it was it was Hope.

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Speaker 1: It was changed, and then it was like you look

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Speaker 1: at the world now and it's like it's like, oh

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Speaker 1: it's it's even bleaker than it was in two tho eight,

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Speaker 1: which is like, yeah, absolutely crazy. Yeah. I think that

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Speaker 1: makes a lot of sense. And I think also just

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Speaker 1: like the last two years have been so prudal. Yeah, absolutely,

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Speaker 1: And I was wondering, Yeah, I wonder thing did you

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Speaker 1: can talk about like what affects the um, what effect

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Speaker 1: the pandemic had on Yellows workers and what effect that

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Speaker 1: had on union organizing. Yeah, absolutely so. Um, I think

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Speaker 1: that it really pulled the mask off the company, which ironically,

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Speaker 1: well everyone was putting the mask on. The mask off

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Speaker 1: was coming on for Starbucks because they always really pretended

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Speaker 1: to be this really awesome progressive company, and it really

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Speaker 1: revealed how performative the company is because they gave us

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Speaker 1: all these COVID benefits for like two three months and

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Speaker 1: then took them right away from us like before. Obviously

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Speaker 1: the pandemic isn't even over now, it definitely wasn't over

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Speaker 1: back and I think it was October they took away

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Speaker 1: like our chees spikes too, exactly. And right around that time,

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Speaker 1: we were also watching our CEO are now former CEO

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Speaker 1: Kevin Johnson, get like a forty million dollar raised, while

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Speaker 1: they had just taken away our hazard pay and there

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Speaker 1: are free food benefits even though we were all still struggling.

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Speaker 1: So then I think that us seeing those benefits being

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Speaker 1: taken away and realizing that the company doesn't care about

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Speaker 1: us in that sense made us start looking harder at everything,

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Speaker 1: Like the company doesn't want to increase our pay, they

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Speaker 1: don't want to give us credit card tipping, they don't

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Speaker 1: want to make our stores safer, um, and every other

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Speaker 1: reason that any store could see to unionize. Like it

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Speaker 1: really highlighted all of those reasons and all the ways

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Speaker 1: the company doesn't care about us as much as they should,

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Speaker 1: and how they really do just see us as a number.

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Speaker 1: So I think that's what really really pushed us all

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Speaker 1: towards unionizing. It's like, if the company doesn't care about

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Speaker 1: us and the people in our stores, then we're going

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Speaker 1: to rely on each other to care about us, and

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Speaker 1: UM push for reunions so that we can take matters

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Speaker 1: into our own hands. And yeah, and I think there's

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Speaker 1: there's a lot of the stuff that you've been talking

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Speaker 1: about that highlights how important that is, which is that, like,

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Speaker 1: you know, you have this combination of management either like

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Speaker 1: do the management immediately above you understanding what's happening and

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Speaker 1: being like we'll just throw you guys at it, will

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Speaker 1: just literally bail and run away from how bad it is.

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Speaker 1: And then you have them the layer management like above you,

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Speaker 1: which is it's a bunch of bureaucrats who like couldn't

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Speaker 1: find their ask if you drew the map and you know,

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Speaker 1: or like oh, hey, here, here's your d escalation training.

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Speaker 1: It's about person mad about drink and it's like I

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Speaker 1: am getting multiple death threats. It's like it's I don't know.

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Speaker 1: We literally had a like someone from I think you're

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Speaker 1: either regional management or maybe a level higher than that,

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Speaker 1: like area management hume into our store the other day,

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Speaker 1: like as a customer and there was something going on.

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Speaker 1: I'm not sure if it was like somebody shouting in

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Speaker 1: the cafe or like two customers were fighting, but this

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Speaker 1: like upper level manager who should know about our store

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Speaker 1: said one of my briefs, does um, so is this

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Speaker 1: like a high incident store? And we were like, I

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Speaker 1: don't know, isn't it your job? Like really like wow, yikes, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: that's something that like, you know, it's not like I learned,

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Speaker 1: Like it's something like you learned intellectually, and then you

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Speaker 1: just see like and then yeah, so it's not you

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Speaker 1: learn intellectually, and then you just sort of viscerally begin

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Speaker 1: to understand when you know you're doing work and you're

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Speaker 1: watching what your managers do, it is it's that like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: like the people who actually knows how the production process

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Speaker 1: works and how the stuff actually goes and what's happening

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Speaker 1: on the shop floor, Like are the people? Are the

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Speaker 1: workers there? And it's like every one above them is

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Speaker 1: just doing some other ship to just making everyone's lives

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Speaker 1: worse and it's just literally curating. It starts that nobody

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Speaker 1: the reason we need a union. And I tell people

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Speaker 1: this all the time whenever I'm going into new stores.

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Speaker 1: Nobody knows your store better than you. Nobody knows like

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Speaker 1: the inner workings of it, how busy you are with

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Speaker 1: the needs of the store, are better than the people

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Speaker 1: that are there forty hours a week. And another thing

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Speaker 1: we talked about a lot in like our our citywide meetings,

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Speaker 1: is like what do the managers even do on it?

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Speaker 1: Like what is their job? What are they working on?

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Speaker 1: Like what your manager do all day and her bushy

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Speaker 1: little corporate up. But I guess you just union busting now,

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Speaker 1: even that they're delicated to another manager below them, So yeah,

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Speaker 1: apparently yeah. Did you ever see the fake tweets the

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Speaker 1: fake Workers United tweets that Starbucks published? Emil you a

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Speaker 1: copy of them, but they literally made this hand out

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Speaker 1: with a list of fake tweets from Workers United, and

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Speaker 1: like the company's responses, to them. But if you look

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Speaker 1: up the company's Twitter account, um, it just doesn't exist.

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Speaker 1: And the tweets from Workers United that they printed out

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Speaker 1: on these hand outs also don't exist. And I think

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Speaker 1: maybe three copies of that got handed out to my

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Speaker 1: store where we all made so much fun of my

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Speaker 1: boss that keep so, um, I guess that's my boss's job.

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Speaker 1: I will I can show these to you and keep

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Speaker 1: them on hand. This is this is like it's the

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Speaker 1: biggest energy of Like, oh, I thought of the perfect

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Speaker 1: argument seven hours later but didn't even the argument is

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Speaker 1: not even real, like they're they're just making up a

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Speaker 1: guy to argue with. Yeah, and he didn't even try

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Speaker 1: that hard because these were handed to me back in April.

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Speaker 1: It says that these all of these tweets were posted

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Speaker 1: on June one, so the data they claimed that this

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Speaker 1: was tweeted hadn't even happen. Whenever I received the end out,

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Speaker 1: I mean, hey, if you if you'll have access to

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Speaker 1: a time machine, I I have some work I need

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Speaker 1: to do. Yeah. Yeah. They say things like, in collective bargaining,

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Speaker 1: you start with everything you have and negotiate for more

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Speaker 1: from there. From Starbucks Workers United right there and then

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Speaker 1: the company's responses literally um and then though we are

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Speaker 1: one Starbucks account said in collective bargaining, everything is up

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Speaker 1: for negotiations if you have more, the same or less,

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Speaker 1: and once you negotiate a contract, you locked in, which

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Speaker 1: which is also funny because it's like like, Okay, you

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Speaker 1: are looking at that like you think that that is

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Speaker 1: actually like a thing that makes you look good and

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Speaker 1: not like a super villain. It's like, no, no, no,

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Speaker 1: if you try to negotiate with us, we will make

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Speaker 1: everything worse for you. It's like, really, it looks good.

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Speaker 1: You know. They try so hard union busts and they

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Speaker 1: just kind of stuck at it. Yeah, it's been it's

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Speaker 1: been comical to watch. It's very funny, which is really

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Speaker 1: funny because like I remember, like I didn't know it's

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Speaker 1: super boll but like I remember, I knew some people

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Speaker 1: who were doing Starbic union organizing like way about like

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Speaker 1: like two thousand, like six or something, and they were like,

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Speaker 1: you know, and it was like they were kind of

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Speaker 1: better at it, like they were willing to just like

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Speaker 1: throw resources at it in a way that like they

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Speaker 1: don't seem to be able to know. I think maybe

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Speaker 1: just because like the there's so many organizations, so many

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Speaker 1: organizing efforts happen happening at once, that it's harder to

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Speaker 1: sort of just like throw all of their stuff at

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Speaker 1: one store. But yeah, it's just it's like incredibly funny

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Speaker 1: watching them just sort of like flail and like you

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Speaker 1: know what I mean, I guess like like all all

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Speaker 1: corporations that you need bust eventually resort to break the

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Speaker 1: law because you know the law. And yeah, had my

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Speaker 1: my district manager um came into my store screwdriver in

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Speaker 1: hand to personally make repairs at my store, it would

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Speaker 1: the funniest thing I have ever seen. It's probably my

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Speaker 1: favorite union busting story. But she was like, yeah, I'm

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Speaker 1: here to cover up the electrical outlets in your bathroom.

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Speaker 1: And we were like cool, why and she was like,

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Speaker 1: so that the homeless people can't like plug in their

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Speaker 1: electric shavers and shaven there. We were like, wow, we've

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Speaker 1: seen we've seen people do a lot of weird things

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Speaker 1: in the bathroom, and that's like not even one of them.

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Speaker 1: You are so out of touch. Oh my gosh, it's

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Speaker 1: been hilarious to watch, Like, wow, that was really some effort,

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Speaker 1: but really, you know, absolutely not immediately now, there's nothing

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Speaker 1: I wanted to talk about that Starbucks is you talked

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Speaker 1: a bit about earlier about Starbucks sort of like having

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Speaker 1: this image as like like progressive organization and okay, like

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Speaker 1: one of the things they've been big on sort of

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Speaker 1: recently is like portraying themselves as this like pro l

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Speaker 1: G B t q I A plus like thing. And

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Speaker 1: I think, like, okay, so there's something that like traditional

387
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Speaker 1: media has finally discovered because they haven't covered labor organizing

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Speaker 1: in forty years and they suddenly started doing it again,

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Speaker 1: and they were like, oh my god, all of the

390
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Speaker 1: union organizers are queer. And it was like anyone who's

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Speaker 1: ever organized a union or anyone who knows anyone who's

392
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Speaker 1: ever been in the union could have told you this

393
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Speaker 1: like thirty years incredible stuff. Is like wow, congratulations, you've

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Speaker 1: discovered this. But yeah, I wanted to ask about sort

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Speaker 1: of I don't know that this kind of bind that

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Speaker 1: like I feel like we're people doing organizing are in

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Speaker 1: right now, which is that Like Okay, So on the

398
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Speaker 1: one hand, you have like in you know, the last

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Speaker 1: sort of year or so, this like incredible increase in

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Speaker 1: rampant homophobia but then simultaneously, like so you know, you

401
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Speaker 1: have to fight that fight. And then simultaneously you have

402
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Speaker 1: these corporations who are trying to you know, like, yeah,

403
00:21:14,520 --> 00:21:17,040
Speaker 1: they're like nominally on our side, and that they're not well,

404
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Speaker 1: I mean they are, they are, they are funding the

405
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Speaker 1: rampant homophobus, but like publicly they don't you know, publicly

406
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Speaker 1: their supportive, but also you know that like their supporter

407
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Speaker 1: because they're trying to sell our identity as a brand.

408
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Speaker 1: And then you know when queer people are like, hey,

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Speaker 1: can we like have stuff that lets us live there?

410
00:21:30,920 --> 00:21:32,680
Speaker 1: Like no, And I was wondering how you've been sort

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Speaker 1: of navigating that. Yeah, so that's been really tough because, um,

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Speaker 1: a lot of our queer partners in Pittsburgh get get

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Speaker 1: their health insurance through Starbucks. You get gender care through Starbucks.

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Speaker 1: And one of the biggest union busting tactics is our cuts.

415
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Speaker 1: And if you cut someone's hours, then they're not eligible

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Speaker 1: for healthcare. So they're really just like dangling the carrot

417
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Speaker 1: on the stick in front of our faces like, oh,

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Speaker 1: if you unionize, then we're going to cut your hours

419
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Speaker 1: and then you can't get your gender affirming health care.

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Speaker 1: So that's like, that's really really sucked. UM. In addition

421
00:22:06,440 --> 00:22:10,840
Speaker 1: to that, UM, there have been now four people about

422
00:22:10,880 --> 00:22:13,399
Speaker 1: to be five. Um, we think one of one person

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Speaker 1: is going to be fired one of these back from vacations.

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Speaker 1: But out of all of us that are fired or

425
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Speaker 1: about to be fired, we are all queer people. So UM,

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Speaker 1: I think that really shows how much store books peer partners.

427
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Speaker 1: And since I've started organizing, in addition to like homophobia

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00:22:30,960 --> 00:22:34,960
Speaker 1: and like discrimination against the rare community, I've also heard

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00:22:35,080 --> 00:22:40,440
Speaker 1: just rampant stories about microaggressions and racism. UM. I've actually

430
00:22:40,680 --> 00:22:44,280
Speaker 1: met a UM a partner that was fired from a

431
00:22:44,359 --> 00:22:47,879
Speaker 1: store in Virginia. I want to say she was I

432
00:22:48,000 --> 00:22:50,320
Speaker 1: believe for my understanding, she was the only black woman

433
00:22:50,320 --> 00:22:52,359
Speaker 1: that worked at her store, and she was fired for

434
00:22:53,320 --> 00:22:56,080
Speaker 1: aggressive behavior. And when I heard that, I was like

435
00:22:57,320 --> 00:23:01,399
Speaker 1: bidding me so just like and also that support manager

436
00:23:01,440 --> 00:23:03,639
Speaker 1: that I was talking about, I've heard rumors that like

437
00:23:04,000 --> 00:23:06,879
Speaker 1: she was transferred from one store to another because she

438
00:23:07,040 --> 00:23:10,040
Speaker 1: was like caught being racist at the first store. Instead

439
00:23:10,040 --> 00:23:12,720
Speaker 1: of being fired, she was transferred and now she got

440
00:23:12,800 --> 00:23:15,919
Speaker 1: she was promoted to store manager and then she fired

441
00:23:15,960 --> 00:23:18,439
Speaker 1: a trans partner at her store, and now she's our

442
00:23:18,480 --> 00:23:24,720
Speaker 1: support manager and fired me. So like it's it's the homophobia. Yeah, yeah,

443
00:23:24,880 --> 00:23:27,840
Speaker 1: it's like it's it's the Catholic Church for racist homophobes.

444
00:23:28,280 --> 00:23:31,720
Speaker 1: Well okay, the Catholic Church for racist homophobes, but corporate

445
00:23:31,840 --> 00:23:35,840
Speaker 1: and well okay, I I I am not going to

446
00:23:35,880 --> 00:23:37,760
Speaker 1: make a claim on the air that they're not also

447
00:23:37,840 --> 00:23:43,080
Speaker 1: doing this with sexual assault, because I they had like

448
00:23:43,119 --> 00:23:47,520
Speaker 1: there's no way that they're not. But yeah, that is Yeah,

449
00:23:47,600 --> 00:23:51,760
Speaker 1: that that that's incredibly bleak. And I would go back

450
00:23:52,080 --> 00:23:53,760
Speaker 1: a second to sort of the gender affirm and care

451
00:23:53,800 --> 00:23:59,720
Speaker 1: stuff because like, yeah, that stuff, it's like like, Okay,

452
00:24:00,280 --> 00:24:02,720
Speaker 1: the thing that they are doing is just like we

453
00:24:02,720 --> 00:24:05,640
Speaker 1: we are holding the genocide button over you. It's like, yeah,

454
00:24:05,680 --> 00:24:07,439
Speaker 1: if if you if you don't comply with us and

455
00:24:07,440 --> 00:24:10,680
Speaker 1: you don't like accept the like absolute ship and scraps

456
00:24:10,680 --> 00:24:12,560
Speaker 1: that we give you, we are going to try to

457
00:24:12,640 --> 00:24:20,160
Speaker 1: kill you. And that is just indescribably horrific. Absolutely. Yeah. Um,

458
00:24:20,200 --> 00:24:22,040
Speaker 1: I know it's something that partners up. There's at least

459
00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:24,280
Speaker 1: one partner at my store that's dealing with that right now.

460
00:24:24,320 --> 00:24:27,879
Speaker 1: She's twenty five about and she is trans, and I

461
00:24:27,920 --> 00:24:31,200
Speaker 1: know that, Um, she's on her parents insurance at the moment,

462
00:24:31,280 --> 00:24:33,320
Speaker 1: but in less than a year she'll have the fun

463
00:24:33,400 --> 00:24:37,040
Speaker 1: insurance elsewhere, most likely through Starbucks. And it's something that

464
00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:39,720
Speaker 1: really got her into organizing. I know that for sure.

465
00:24:40,359 --> 00:24:43,080
Speaker 1: Um yeah, it's it's been a really scary moment for her.

466
00:24:43,520 --> 00:24:48,360
Speaker 1: Definitely something she's worried about. Yeah. Yeah, just the risk

467
00:24:48,400 --> 00:24:50,760
Speaker 1: of being fired, the risk of having your hours cut

468
00:24:50,840 --> 00:24:55,480
Speaker 1: and stop being eligible for benefits. It's awful, and like

469
00:24:55,520 --> 00:24:57,000
Speaker 1: she doesn't feel like she can get a job like

470
00:24:57,040 --> 00:24:59,119
Speaker 1: anywhere else just because Starbucks is one of the like

471
00:24:59,160 --> 00:25:02,520
Speaker 1: Starbucks offers like decent health insurance, so it's like I'm

472
00:25:02,560 --> 00:25:04,920
Speaker 1: kind of trapped here until I can get out, until

473
00:25:04,960 --> 00:25:08,560
Speaker 1: I can get another job with insurance benefits. Yeah, and

474
00:25:08,640 --> 00:25:12,359
Speaker 1: you know, that's incredibly it's incredibly hard, especially right now.

475
00:25:12,880 --> 00:25:18,320
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, I don't know, it's i mean, it's

476
00:25:18,359 --> 00:25:22,680
Speaker 1: not really surprising that they're doing this, but it's yeah,

477
00:25:22,720 --> 00:25:26,320
Speaker 1: it's it's really depressing and it sucks. And the fact

478
00:25:26,359 --> 00:25:30,040
Speaker 1: that they're you know, like sending sending racist to do

479
00:25:30,119 --> 00:25:36,800
Speaker 1: homophobias like h it's yeah, it's like dystopian like this

480
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:40,600
Speaker 1: happened and been like is this real life? Like this

481
00:25:40,680 --> 00:25:45,200
Speaker 1: is crazy and um, they just fired another black Clear

482
00:25:45,280 --> 00:25:47,639
Speaker 1: organizer and fits were just yesterday and they're trying to

483
00:25:47,680 --> 00:25:51,560
Speaker 1: make it look like he resigned, um, but really they

484
00:25:51,600 --> 00:25:54,400
Speaker 1: gave him like a couple like options like you need

485
00:25:54,440 --> 00:25:57,399
Speaker 1: to have at least one weekend day available, or you

486
00:25:57,440 --> 00:26:00,919
Speaker 1: need to demote yourself, or you need to transfer to

487
00:26:00,920 --> 00:26:04,359
Speaker 1: a different store. And they were like, I can't really

488
00:26:04,359 --> 00:26:07,120
Speaker 1: do any of those options, like none of those work

489
00:26:07,160 --> 00:26:10,560
Speaker 1: for me. And then the company said like, oh, yeah,

490
00:26:10,680 --> 00:26:14,720
Speaker 1: Jimmy resigned, like we totally didn't fire them, but they

491
00:26:14,960 --> 00:26:17,120
Speaker 1: just resigned and sorry, you get to peel it because

492
00:26:17,160 --> 00:26:21,879
Speaker 1: you resigned by yeah, it's a real we didn't fire you.

493
00:26:21,920 --> 00:26:27,360
Speaker 1: We simply forced you out by making utterly impossible demands. Yep.

494
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:30,440
Speaker 1: It's like it really reminds me of like it's the

495
00:26:30,520 --> 00:26:32,280
Speaker 1: kind of stuff a country does when they want to

496
00:26:32,320 --> 00:26:34,400
Speaker 1: go to war, where it's like, yeah, we're gonna we're

497
00:26:34,400 --> 00:26:35,879
Speaker 1: gonna give you a bunch of demands that it is

498
00:26:35,920 --> 00:26:38,040
Speaker 1: literally physically impossible for you to comply with, and that

499
00:26:38,080 --> 00:26:41,160
Speaker 1: because you don't comply with him, we're getting invade. M hmm, yeah,

500
00:26:41,359 --> 00:26:48,000
Speaker 1: exactly exactly, Like oh, um, although I did just find

501
00:26:48,040 --> 00:26:51,280
Speaker 1: out some good news today. So there's this one bar

502
00:26:51,400 --> 00:26:54,399
Speaker 1: where most of the union organizers hang out all the time,

503
00:26:55,080 --> 00:26:57,560
Speaker 1: and they message us on Twitter today and they want

504
00:26:57,600 --> 00:27:02,239
Speaker 1: to throw a queer dance party fundraiser for like our

505
00:27:02,320 --> 00:27:06,520
Speaker 1: solid and strike fund. It was like literally the most

506
00:27:06,600 --> 00:27:09,400
Speaker 1: us thing I can mostly think of, like a queer

507
00:27:09,480 --> 00:27:13,600
Speaker 1: dance party fundraiser at our favorite bar. Like the bathroom

508
00:27:13,600 --> 00:27:15,760
Speaker 1: attendant from the bar like showed up to our strike

509
00:27:15,840 --> 00:27:18,639
Speaker 1: at my store and friends of the bartender there. It

510
00:27:18,800 --> 00:27:22,919
Speaker 1: was like the best Twitter DM ever. I was like,

511
00:27:23,000 --> 00:27:25,160
Speaker 1: that's so funny. I'm literally going there with the other

512
00:27:25,200 --> 00:27:30,600
Speaker 1: person that got fired from my store like tonight. So

513
00:27:30,720 --> 00:27:33,399
Speaker 1: we're very excited for that. Yeah, and I guess that

514
00:27:33,440 --> 00:27:36,200
Speaker 1: means that something else I wanted to talk about, which is, um, Yeah,

515
00:27:36,240 --> 00:27:38,280
Speaker 1: do you want to talk a little bit about like

516
00:27:39,000 --> 00:27:41,720
Speaker 1: what happened after you got fired and the support you've

517
00:27:41,720 --> 00:27:44,720
Speaker 1: been getting in the like the backing from other unions

518
00:27:44,720 --> 00:27:48,919
Speaker 1: that you've been getting. Totally. Yeah. So my store is

519
00:27:48,920 --> 00:27:52,520
Speaker 1: actually just like a block away from the United steel

520
00:27:52,520 --> 00:27:56,400
Speaker 1: Workers headquarters, which is incredible because anytime we have any

521
00:27:56,400 --> 00:28:02,160
Speaker 1: sort of direct action, we get like forty steel Workers' star. Yeah.

522
00:28:02,520 --> 00:28:05,040
Speaker 1: The day after I was fired, I I have this

523
00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:08,000
Speaker 1: very funny picture that's on my Twitter UM of me

524
00:28:08,160 --> 00:28:11,119
Speaker 1: just standing like with like forty steal workers sitting behind me.

525
00:28:11,200 --> 00:28:14,480
Speaker 1: They found like the two biggest foods sting on each

526
00:28:14,520 --> 00:28:17,440
Speaker 1: side of me where I started up stay and in

527
00:28:17,480 --> 00:28:21,280
Speaker 1: the protest. This is my new favorite picture of myself.

528
00:28:21,920 --> 00:28:24,159
Speaker 1: So that was day one. We had a rally. We

529
00:28:24,160 --> 00:28:26,440
Speaker 1: had really good turn out with all the steel workers

530
00:28:26,600 --> 00:28:30,000
Speaker 1: and a bunch of other community allies are Symphony UM.

531
00:28:30,040 --> 00:28:33,280
Speaker 1: Symphony musicians have a have a labor union to the

532
00:28:33,359 --> 00:28:36,400
Speaker 1: library workers. UM. They all came out for the first

533
00:28:36,480 --> 00:28:40,200
Speaker 1: day of the rally at Market Square and my citywide

534
00:28:40,320 --> 00:28:43,600
Speaker 1: organizing committee was actually able to pull together a total

535
00:28:43,640 --> 00:28:47,360
Speaker 1: of four strikes. What happened within the course of two days.

536
00:28:47,600 --> 00:28:52,120
Speaker 1: The planning happened in like basically under twenty four hours. Insane.

537
00:28:54,280 --> 00:28:58,920
Speaker 1: So yeah, I got fired. Wednesday, Thursday was the rally

538
00:28:58,960 --> 00:29:02,080
Speaker 1: at my store with all the steal workers. Friday, the

539
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:04,600
Speaker 1: East Carson Store in the South Side of Pittsburgh went

540
00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:07,680
Speaker 1: on strike. The East Side store in the Bloomfield store

541
00:29:07,960 --> 00:29:10,680
Speaker 1: all went on strike for the full day UM. The

542
00:29:10,720 --> 00:29:15,160
Speaker 1: south Side store continued the strike into Saturday and then

543
00:29:16,560 --> 00:29:20,840
Speaker 1: UM Sunday, my store went on strike finally, so, um,

544
00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:24,160
Speaker 1: it was incredible. We had we have a labor choir

545
00:29:24,240 --> 00:29:27,160
Speaker 1: in Pittsburgh, which is in It's just like a dude

546
00:29:27,160 --> 00:29:31,320
Speaker 1: with a guitar. He's my favorite person ever. Um. So

547
00:29:31,400 --> 00:29:33,960
Speaker 1: we had the labor choir out at all of our events.

548
00:29:34,560 --> 00:29:38,360
Speaker 1: And um we had, like I said, the library workers,

549
00:29:38,440 --> 00:29:42,920
Speaker 1: the steel workers, the Symphony Union. Um, we have UE.

550
00:29:43,480 --> 00:29:46,200
Speaker 1: We have d s A, which is Democratic Socialists of America.

551
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:49,520
Speaker 1: We have the Party for Socialism and Liberation or really

552
00:29:49,520 --> 00:29:52,560
Speaker 1: strong allies to us. And we had like a lot

553
00:29:52,640 --> 00:29:55,239
Speaker 1: of the regular my my favorite customers showed up at

554
00:29:55,240 --> 00:29:58,960
Speaker 1: my store of course, which made cry. One of my customers,

555
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:01,080
Speaker 1: one of my favorite customers who comes in multiple times

556
00:30:01,120 --> 00:30:03,480
Speaker 1: a day, said you shouldn't be standing out here on

557
00:30:03,560 --> 00:30:05,440
Speaker 1: the on the sidewalk, you should be back there behind

558
00:30:05,440 --> 00:30:07,440
Speaker 1: the counter making coffee. And I was like, I know,

559
00:30:07,640 --> 00:30:11,160
Speaker 1: thank you. Um. We had a couple of our regulars

560
00:30:11,480 --> 00:30:15,560
Speaker 1: change their mobile order name to Tori and Kim, so

561
00:30:15,600 --> 00:30:18,040
Speaker 1: that every time he orders a drink to my store,

562
00:30:18,120 --> 00:30:21,680
Speaker 1: they have to call out the name Tory and Kim.

563
00:30:21,720 --> 00:30:24,800
Speaker 1: That's great. And we set up a go fund me

564
00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:28,240
Speaker 1: and we received way more donations than we thought that

565
00:30:28,280 --> 00:30:31,520
Speaker 1: we would get so um for all the workers at

566
00:30:31,560 --> 00:30:33,280
Speaker 1: my store that went on strike. In addition to the

567
00:30:33,360 --> 00:30:37,280
Speaker 1: seventy pay that we received from the union for the day, UM,

568
00:30:37,320 --> 00:30:39,560
Speaker 1: we were able to pledge twenty dollars to each of

569
00:30:39,600 --> 00:30:42,360
Speaker 1: them to try to make their paychecks pole and cover

570
00:30:42,440 --> 00:30:45,440
Speaker 1: some of their last tips. That was incredible and really

571
00:30:45,480 --> 00:30:48,960
Speaker 1: just a demonstration of how much support we have in

572
00:30:49,000 --> 00:30:51,880
Speaker 1: our area. You know, they say Pittsburgh as a union town. Yeah,

573
00:30:52,640 --> 00:30:56,760
Speaker 1: really is? It turns out, yeah, And it's really cool

574
00:30:56,800 --> 00:31:00,960
Speaker 1: to see. I don't know, I there like one of

575
00:31:01,000 --> 00:31:02,680
Speaker 1: one of the things that I keep seeing is this

576
00:31:02,760 --> 00:31:05,720
Speaker 1: sort of like like one of one of the sort

577
00:31:05,720 --> 00:31:08,480
Speaker 1: of right wing tactics that have been like just inundated

578
00:31:08,520 --> 00:31:11,520
Speaker 1: within the last like a couple of years, has been

579
00:31:11,600 --> 00:31:14,880
Speaker 1: like trying to separate out like oh, here are these

580
00:31:14,880 --> 00:31:16,880
Speaker 1: people who are workers, but like, oh, they're not workers

581
00:31:16,920 --> 00:31:20,600
Speaker 1: because they're like oh, they're like doing cultural stuff for

582
00:31:20,680 --> 00:31:23,320
Speaker 1: They're like, oh, they just like serve drinks and like,

583
00:31:23,400 --> 00:31:25,200
Speaker 1: you know, you look at actual labor. It's like that's no,

584
00:31:26,000 --> 00:31:27,600
Speaker 1: like none of this, none of this, none of these

585
00:31:27,640 --> 00:31:30,640
Speaker 1: division things are real like people showing from each other.

586
00:31:31,120 --> 00:31:34,040
Speaker 1: It's always get worried that people will be like judgmental

587
00:31:34,080 --> 00:31:36,520
Speaker 1: about that. Like I'm always kind of like surprised when

588
00:31:36,560 --> 00:31:38,640
Speaker 1: the steel workers show up. I'm like, I know, I'm

589
00:31:38,680 --> 00:31:40,760
Speaker 1: not a steel worker. I don't make steel, I don't

590
00:31:40,800 --> 00:31:45,160
Speaker 1: work in a factory or anything. Just make coffee. But um,

591
00:31:45,200 --> 00:31:47,560
Speaker 1: everyone is so supportive and they are always so willing

592
00:31:47,600 --> 00:31:50,160
Speaker 1: to stand in solidarity, which is really cool. But it's

593
00:31:50,200 --> 00:31:52,280
Speaker 1: something I'm always like worried about, Like I know, it

594
00:31:52,280 --> 00:31:54,880
Speaker 1: doesn't feel like I'm a real worker, but like union,

595
00:31:55,200 --> 00:31:59,600
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm in a podcast union, so like talking

596
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:07,600
Speaker 1: about yeah, I have I have like arguably like if

597
00:32:07,200 --> 00:32:09,320
Speaker 1: if if if if you're going to use the really

598
00:32:09,400 --> 00:32:13,440
Speaker 1: silly like like I don't know, sort of like cultural

599
00:32:13,440 --> 00:32:15,520
Speaker 1: analysis of what a worker is. Like a podcast union

600
00:32:15,600 --> 00:32:17,440
Speaker 1: is like the silliest union every and it's great, no

601
00:32:17,600 --> 00:32:19,800
Speaker 1: it rules. It turns out where workers we go fight

602
00:32:19,840 --> 00:32:22,440
Speaker 1: for other people to other people fight for like the

603
00:32:22,440 --> 00:32:25,960
Speaker 1: the when when when we when we were trying to

604
00:32:26,000 --> 00:32:31,320
Speaker 1: get union recognition, like the NFL Players Association was like, hey,

605
00:32:31,360 --> 00:32:37,760
Speaker 1: you guys need to recognize this, and we were like yeah, yeah,

606
00:32:38,040 --> 00:32:40,120
Speaker 1: just um, We've been going to a lot of rallies

607
00:32:40,160 --> 00:32:42,800
Speaker 1: for the Planned Parenthood Union and yeah, which I didn't

608
00:32:42,840 --> 00:32:46,000
Speaker 1: I didn't actually know that they existed. That yeah, I actually,

609
00:32:46,000 --> 00:32:49,600
Speaker 1: well it wasn't Pittsburgh, but I was just talking. Actually

610
00:32:49,600 --> 00:32:51,480
Speaker 1: probably I don't know what these are gonna err in,

611
00:32:51,560 --> 00:32:54,080
Speaker 1: but like, yeah, that I just talked to people from

612
00:32:54,080 --> 00:32:57,800
Speaker 1: the union. Oh my gosh. Yeah, they were cool. To

613
00:32:57,880 --> 00:33:00,960
Speaker 1: the labor choir there again, I would tell you solidarity

614
00:33:01,160 --> 00:33:05,400
Speaker 1: all around. I love to see it. Oh yeah, that's

615
00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:09,600
Speaker 1: that's really cool. Mm hmm. Yeah, lots of unions in Pittsburgh.

616
00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:12,240
Speaker 1: A good time. I met a lot of really cool people.

617
00:33:12,440 --> 00:33:14,800
Speaker 1: I feel like all the people I've met since I've

618
00:33:14,840 --> 00:33:18,120
Speaker 1: been involved with union stuff, I have been like really cool.

619
00:33:18,680 --> 00:33:22,000
Speaker 1: The first time I talked anywhere, it was at the

620
00:33:22,040 --> 00:33:28,360
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania a f l C i OH convention and um whatever.

621
00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:29,800
Speaker 1: I was told that when of our I talk, my

622
00:33:29,800 --> 00:33:32,400
Speaker 1: speech was supposed to end with brothers and sisters, can

623
00:33:32,440 --> 00:33:34,200
Speaker 1: I count on your support? Because they were passing a

624
00:33:34,200 --> 00:33:36,640
Speaker 1: resolution for us. But one of my brieftas told me

625
00:33:36,680 --> 00:33:39,000
Speaker 1: it would be funnier if I said, can I get

626
00:33:39,040 --> 00:33:41,840
Speaker 1: a hell? Yeah? So I said some very serious words

627
00:33:41,840 --> 00:33:44,240
Speaker 1: to this room full of serious look at people, and

628
00:33:44,280 --> 00:33:46,120
Speaker 1: then I said on behalf of all of our partners

629
00:33:46,120 --> 00:33:48,640
Speaker 1: at the market Square Starbucks. Can I get a hell yeah?

630
00:33:48,760 --> 00:33:54,920
Speaker 1: And they all so happy and I was like, cool,

631
00:33:54,960 --> 00:33:58,400
Speaker 1: I found my people. That was like the first time

632
00:33:58,440 --> 00:34:04,560
Speaker 1: I talked anywhere. That was funny. That's awesome. Yeah, this

633
00:34:04,640 --> 00:34:06,880
Speaker 1: is and and and another reason to unionize. You get

634
00:34:06,960 --> 00:34:08,600
Speaker 1: to beat a bunch of really cool people and then

635
00:34:08,840 --> 00:34:13,560
Speaker 1: they show up for you and it's just incredible experience. Yeah.

636
00:34:13,600 --> 00:34:15,680
Speaker 1: On my last kid vassing trip, we went out in

637
00:34:15,760 --> 00:34:17,920
Speaker 1: Games of two when when we reconvened at the end

638
00:34:17,920 --> 00:34:19,120
Speaker 1: of the night for dinner, and we were like, oh,

639
00:34:19,200 --> 00:34:21,960
Speaker 1: we should stop at our one store that we visited again,

640
00:34:22,160 --> 00:34:23,719
Speaker 1: like all four of us, and I was like, yeah,

641
00:34:23,719 --> 00:34:26,239
Speaker 1: we should like go in and be like, look, guys,

642
00:34:26,320 --> 00:34:32,759
Speaker 1: I joined the union and I made three whole friends. Yeah.

643
00:34:33,120 --> 00:34:35,920
Speaker 1: Also just talking at the UM, I was on a

644
00:34:35,960 --> 00:34:40,040
Speaker 1: panel at Women's Labor School, which was really awesome. It

645
00:34:40,080 --> 00:34:43,200
Speaker 1: was at Penn State University and that was a really

646
00:34:43,280 --> 00:34:45,480
Speaker 1: really cool experience. I met all the all the female

647
00:34:45,520 --> 00:34:49,200
Speaker 1: union leaders. It's a really great event overall. It's really

648
00:34:49,200 --> 00:34:55,440
Speaker 1: cool people involvedaltore. Hell yeah, I love unions. Good stuff. Absolutely.

649
00:34:55,800 --> 00:34:59,040
Speaker 1: I got a cool pin that says labor women get

650
00:34:59,080 --> 00:35:01,160
Speaker 1: in good trouble and I was like, yeah, that's what

651
00:35:01,200 --> 00:35:15,359
Speaker 1: I'm doing absolutely hell yeah. Yeah. So these days I'm

652
00:35:15,400 --> 00:35:17,680
Speaker 1: just working with UM some other stores in the Greater

653
00:35:17,760 --> 00:35:20,600
Speaker 1: Fitburg area helping get them filed. I won't be too

654
00:35:20,600 --> 00:35:22,840
Speaker 1: specific about this, but we are going to see some

655
00:35:22,880 --> 00:35:25,400
Speaker 1: stores picking up in DC, which is really really exciting.

656
00:35:25,480 --> 00:35:27,840
Speaker 1: We've been doing some canvassing trips out there. Well. At

657
00:35:27,880 --> 00:35:31,480
Speaker 1: Starbucks Workers United, we call it a clean play because

658
00:35:32,080 --> 00:35:34,160
Speaker 1: in Starbucks what a clean play is is that one

659
00:35:34,200 --> 00:35:37,360
Speaker 1: day a week, UM, all the closing crew is scheduled

660
00:35:37,360 --> 00:35:38,759
Speaker 1: for an extra two hours at the end of their

661
00:35:38,760 --> 00:35:40,560
Speaker 1: shift deep clean the store, and they call that a

662
00:35:40,560 --> 00:35:43,640
Speaker 1: clean play. So we like to take Starbucks plan language.

663
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:47,840
Speaker 1: So we feel like our little canvassing blitzes clean plays.

664
00:35:48,080 --> 00:35:50,600
Speaker 1: So for the DC clean play, we've been I've been

665
00:35:50,600 --> 00:35:54,280
Speaker 1: out there twice. UM. We have visited a ton of stores,

666
00:35:54,600 --> 00:35:57,040
Speaker 1: definitely some interests there. Seems like the union busting has

667
00:35:57,040 --> 00:35:59,320
Speaker 1: been really tough, but we have we have one store

668
00:35:59,440 --> 00:36:02,560
Speaker 1: that's guys and you'll see it in the news soon.

669
00:36:04,200 --> 00:36:06,600
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, I'm very proud. It was like one of

670
00:36:06,800 --> 00:36:09,400
Speaker 1: that was one of my DC leads. UM they've reached

671
00:36:09,400 --> 00:36:12,360
Speaker 1: out to us on our website for an organizing request,

672
00:36:12,880 --> 00:36:16,720
Speaker 1: and um, they've just been like super strong leaders and

673
00:36:17,200 --> 00:36:20,920
Speaker 1: they've been incredible and union investing really hasn't faced them

674
00:36:20,920 --> 00:36:23,560
Speaker 1: at all, and they're going to be stress very proud

675
00:36:23,560 --> 00:36:25,680
Speaker 1: of them, a little bit proud of myself, but they

676
00:36:25,920 --> 00:36:28,480
Speaker 1: they can have all the credit for that. They they

677
00:36:28,560 --> 00:36:32,759
Speaker 1: really like stay strong throughout the union busting, do good stuff.

678
00:36:32,800 --> 00:36:34,879
Speaker 1: It's scary to be the first store in your area too,

679
00:36:35,640 --> 00:36:38,600
Speaker 1: to actually make moves. Like my friend Jake Welsh, he

680
00:36:38,760 --> 00:36:41,239
Speaker 1: was the first store in Pittsburgh. His store was the

681
00:36:41,239 --> 00:36:43,760
Speaker 1: first in Pittsburgh. And I know that's like really scary,

682
00:36:44,239 --> 00:36:48,160
Speaker 1: and I'm glad that it's happening because it feels like

683
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:51,000
Speaker 1: once the one store goes, then the dominoes starting to fall.

684
00:36:51,040 --> 00:36:53,560
Speaker 1: So once we see that one store in DC file

685
00:36:53,680 --> 00:36:55,640
Speaker 1: for the union election, we're going to see a lot

686
00:36:55,680 --> 00:37:00,279
Speaker 1: more go down there. Um, are you able to talk

687
00:37:00,280 --> 00:37:02,960
Speaker 1: at all about what the search of organizing process has

688
00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:04,839
Speaker 1: been like? And you know, if you can't talk about

689
00:37:04,840 --> 00:37:06,360
Speaker 1: like what has been like as an organizer, just like

690
00:37:06,520 --> 00:37:08,560
Speaker 1: what it was like at your store and what it's

691
00:37:08,600 --> 00:37:12,560
Speaker 1: been like going to other stores totally. So at my

692
00:37:12,680 --> 00:37:16,960
Speaker 1: store we started. We had heard a little bit about

693
00:37:18,160 --> 00:37:20,879
Speaker 1: what Buffalo was doing, and we started very casually talking

694
00:37:20,880 --> 00:37:23,480
Speaker 1: about it at my store, like, yeah, if any store

695
00:37:23,480 --> 00:37:25,640
Speaker 1: needs a union, it is the store. Like we are

696
00:37:26,040 --> 00:37:29,840
Speaker 1: an absolute shit show here, so we could definitely usnized

697
00:37:29,920 --> 00:37:32,839
Speaker 1: that would be awesome. Um really had no idea how

698
00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:35,799
Speaker 1: to get started though, until a couple of weeks later,

699
00:37:36,120 --> 00:37:38,520
Speaker 1: I get a panicked phone call from one of my

700
00:37:38,600 --> 00:37:41,480
Speaker 1: baristas and she was like, Tori, this weird guy came

701
00:37:41,520 --> 00:37:43,160
Speaker 1: into the store when I was on a register today

702
00:37:43,280 --> 00:37:45,960
Speaker 1: and he started asking me questions about unions, and I

703
00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:47,719
Speaker 1: know he wasn't a barista, and I think he was

704
00:37:47,760 --> 00:37:50,520
Speaker 1: a corporate spy. And we were like, oh okay, So

705
00:37:50,560 --> 00:37:54,000
Speaker 1: we googled a guy started to like like get some information.

706
00:37:54,040 --> 00:37:56,720
Speaker 1: We found like his LinkedIn or his coworkers LinkedIn account,

707
00:37:57,040 --> 00:37:59,839
Speaker 1: and we were like, okay, they seemed trustworthy, We're still

708
00:37:59,840 --> 00:38:02,640
Speaker 1: in not sure, So we emailed the guy from a

709
00:38:02,760 --> 00:38:05,719
Speaker 1: burner email account. The fake name. I think the fake

710
00:38:05,800 --> 00:38:08,560
Speaker 1: name was like Darren or something, even though like our

711
00:38:08,640 --> 00:38:12,319
Speaker 1: names are like Tor and Kelly and Kayla. So we

712
00:38:12,400 --> 00:38:15,120
Speaker 1: emailed them from a fake name and a Burner account

713
00:38:15,160 --> 00:38:18,880
Speaker 1: and eventually got in contact with Daisy Pickens, who is

714
00:38:19,000 --> 00:38:21,840
Speaker 1: now our national campaign director, but at the time she

715
00:38:21,920 --> 00:38:25,200
Speaker 1: was working mainly in Pittsburgh and from there she she

716
00:38:25,280 --> 00:38:28,359
Speaker 1: taught us everything we know about organizing. We built an

717
00:38:28,400 --> 00:38:32,200
Speaker 1: organizing committee consisting of me, Kelly, and Kayla because like

718
00:38:32,239 --> 00:38:34,640
Speaker 1: the three of us were pretty good friends. And we

719
00:38:34,719 --> 00:38:37,359
Speaker 1: got cards signed. We were able to get on people

720
00:38:37,360 --> 00:38:40,520
Speaker 1: want my store to sign a card, and we filed unanimously.

721
00:38:43,000 --> 00:38:46,080
Speaker 1: Yeah so um. Something that stores do right before they

722
00:38:46,120 --> 00:38:49,400
Speaker 1: file is they write a Dear Howard letter. And you

723
00:38:49,480 --> 00:38:51,120
Speaker 1: might have seen these on Twitter. If you haven't, you

724
00:38:51,120 --> 00:38:53,800
Speaker 1: didn't find them on the Starbucks Workers United like national

725
00:38:54,120 --> 00:38:57,560
Speaker 1: official Twitter, they always post those there. So we wrote

726
00:38:57,560 --> 00:39:00,040
Speaker 1: our Dear Howard. We turned in our cards to the

727
00:39:00,120 --> 00:39:03,240
Speaker 1: n l RP office, and right after I finished turning

728
00:39:03,239 --> 00:39:04,960
Speaker 1: in the cards to then l RB, I walked right

729
00:39:04,960 --> 00:39:07,080
Speaker 1: back to my store and I had printed out a

730
00:39:07,080 --> 00:39:09,319
Speaker 1: physical copy of our Dear Howard, and I handed it

731
00:39:09,360 --> 00:39:12,600
Speaker 1: to my store manager, Joe. I wanted you to hear

732
00:39:12,640 --> 00:39:16,799
Speaker 1: it from me, and he was like, okay. UM. From there,

733
00:39:16,840 --> 00:39:20,120
Speaker 1: the union busting started. We had captive audience meetings, which

734
00:39:20,360 --> 00:39:23,799
Speaker 1: I believe to my understanding the company has stopped doing

735
00:39:23,840 --> 00:39:26,200
Speaker 1: because they were kind of declared illegal, or maybe it

736
00:39:26,280 --> 00:39:28,759
Speaker 1: was just that the information they were sharing was so

737
00:39:28,920 --> 00:39:32,640
Speaker 1: misleading that it was declared illegal. But they handed us

738
00:39:32,640 --> 00:39:37,560
Speaker 1: like a bunch of really really misleading handouts saying things

739
00:39:37,640 --> 00:39:41,400
Speaker 1: like withdrawn petitions. If Workers United thinks that you're going

740
00:39:41,440 --> 00:39:44,600
Speaker 1: to lose lose your union election, they will withdraw your

741
00:39:44,600 --> 00:39:48,960
Speaker 1: petition and abandon you, which is crazy. Another thing was

742
00:39:49,000 --> 00:39:52,839
Speaker 1: that like, if if the union thinks that you're going

743
00:39:52,840 --> 00:39:54,440
Speaker 1: to vote no, they're going to try to talk you

744
00:39:54,480 --> 00:39:56,959
Speaker 1: out of voting. But Starbucks is the one that really

745
00:39:57,000 --> 00:39:59,200
Speaker 1: cares about your voice, and we wanted to make sure

746
00:39:59,200 --> 00:40:02,319
Speaker 1: everyone has a voice. We're like, literally, you can look

747
00:40:02,360 --> 00:40:05,440
Speaker 1: objectively at this. You can see what Starbucks has done

748
00:40:05,480 --> 00:40:07,719
Speaker 1: to try to prevent you from voting, Like they were

749
00:40:07,760 --> 00:40:12,360
Speaker 1: pushing for in person stores or in person elections in

750
00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:17,080
Speaker 1: stores where most of the partners don't have cars, are um,

751
00:40:17,080 --> 00:40:19,440
Speaker 1: busy with other things, have second jobs, and just couldn't

752
00:40:19,480 --> 00:40:24,279
Speaker 1: feasibly vote in person. Um. They challenge ballots left and right,

753
00:40:24,440 --> 00:40:26,799
Speaker 1: they think. I think they challenged a total of nine

754
00:40:26,840 --> 00:40:30,640
Speaker 1: ballots at my store, including Kelly's ballot, even though Kelly

755
00:40:30,719 --> 00:40:34,400
Speaker 1: was literally like working at the time of our ballot count.

756
00:40:34,400 --> 00:40:37,000
Speaker 1: She was literally behind the counter and like you can

757
00:40:37,040 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 1: see her like in the zoom call like people as

758
00:40:39,200 --> 00:40:41,000
Speaker 1: she came out to watch the ballot counts on her break,

759
00:40:41,280 --> 00:40:43,279
Speaker 1: they tried to challenge her ballot claiming that she didn't

760
00:40:43,280 --> 00:40:46,000
Speaker 1: work there. So there's just like hard evidence that the

761
00:40:46,000 --> 00:40:48,399
Speaker 1: company is the one that doesn't want people to vote.

762
00:40:48,800 --> 00:40:51,560
Speaker 1: So we got through the union busting. It was it

763
00:40:51,640 --> 00:40:55,759
Speaker 1: was tough, it was an uphill battle, and eventually we

764
00:40:55,800 --> 00:41:01,080
Speaker 1: won our election eight to one on May six. So

765
00:41:01,520 --> 00:41:05,680
Speaker 1: after that, I became an intern with Workers United UM

766
00:41:05,719 --> 00:41:08,680
Speaker 1: for the Summer Solidarity Internship program, and that's when I

767
00:41:08,719 --> 00:41:11,759
Speaker 1: started really getting into helping other stores file. So there

768
00:41:11,840 --> 00:41:15,480
Speaker 1: was one out in out in the Pittsburgh suburbs like

769
00:41:15,560 --> 00:41:19,360
Speaker 1: Greater Pittsburgh area. Peters Township was the first store, like

770
00:41:19,440 --> 00:41:22,760
Speaker 1: my first really solid lead that I ever took on UM.

771
00:41:22,800 --> 00:41:25,160
Speaker 1: They filed. I helped them write their Dear Howard letter.

772
00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:28,800
Speaker 1: We were interviewed by the Washington Post. Super cool. So

773
00:41:29,040 --> 00:41:32,160
Speaker 1: they have their ballot count on August eighteen. Very excited

774
00:41:32,200 --> 00:41:34,200
Speaker 1: for them. I have my stores in DC that I'm

775
00:41:34,239 --> 00:41:36,800
Speaker 1: working with and a lot of other stores throughout Pittsburgh

776
00:41:37,520 --> 00:41:40,640
Speaker 1: and um going on a lot of Queen play trips,

777
00:41:40,640 --> 00:41:42,719
Speaker 1: whether it's a big one to Washington, d C. Or

778
00:41:42,960 --> 00:41:45,719
Speaker 1: smaller local one. But we'll go out in teams of two,

779
00:41:46,000 --> 00:41:47,960
Speaker 1: visit as many stores as we can possibly get to

780
00:41:48,040 --> 00:41:50,680
Speaker 1: in one day, and we wear our Star Wars Workers

781
00:41:50,760 --> 00:41:54,080
Speaker 1: United shirts, so immediately people know why we're there. Basically,

782
00:41:54,080 --> 00:41:55,400
Speaker 1: just go up as if we're going to order a

783
00:41:55,440 --> 00:41:57,959
Speaker 1: drink and be like, hey, so, like we heard about

784
00:41:57,960 --> 00:42:00,920
Speaker 1: what we're doing in downtown Pittsburgh were like the stores

785
00:42:00,920 --> 00:42:02,800
Speaker 1: in Buffalo that unionized. You have to feel like, what

786
00:42:02,840 --> 00:42:05,280
Speaker 1: do you guys think of that? And typically our approach

787
00:42:05,360 --> 00:42:10,000
Speaker 1: is to find the gayest looking person. Yeah, we gotta

788
00:42:10,040 --> 00:42:13,280
Speaker 1: trying to find like the young, like maybe like twentysomething

789
00:42:13,520 --> 00:42:16,319
Speaker 1: person with like dyet hair and a septom piercing. It's

790
00:42:16,400 --> 00:42:20,200
Speaker 1: always the sceptom piercings. Let me tell you, they're always

791
00:42:20,239 --> 00:42:22,120
Speaker 1: the leader, the ring leaders at their store. I don't

792
00:42:22,120 --> 00:42:24,759
Speaker 1: know why, but it's been funny. So yeah, I try

793
00:42:24,760 --> 00:42:26,120
Speaker 1: to find the gayest person and be like, hey, so

794
00:42:26,239 --> 00:42:28,960
Speaker 1: what do you think about unions? And that's how we

795
00:42:29,080 --> 00:42:32,920
Speaker 1: brought a new store. Yeah, yeah, and we've been pretty

796
00:42:32,920 --> 00:42:35,239
Speaker 1: successful with it. A lot of people either don't know

797
00:42:35,280 --> 00:42:39,200
Speaker 1: what a union is or they really like their boss,

798
00:42:39,480 --> 00:42:43,480
Speaker 1: and that seems to be the company's best union tactic

799
00:42:43,680 --> 00:42:46,360
Speaker 1: union busting tactic because by having good bosses, because we

800
00:42:46,400 --> 00:42:50,440
Speaker 1: always say that sometimes the best organizer is the boss.

801
00:42:50,480 --> 00:42:52,600
Speaker 1: So sometimes the stores where they're like, we love our boss,

802
00:42:52,600 --> 00:42:54,279
Speaker 1: our boss takes such a good care of us, I'm like,

803
00:42:54,440 --> 00:42:57,440
Speaker 1: darn it, um, Like, good for you guys, but you

804
00:42:57,440 --> 00:43:00,680
Speaker 1: should unionize anyway. Yeah, I would also like, like I

805
00:43:00,719 --> 00:43:02,640
Speaker 1: would say, it's like I really like my boss, and

806
00:43:02,680 --> 00:43:06,560
Speaker 1: I am also still because yeah, totally trying to explain

807
00:43:06,640 --> 00:43:09,680
Speaker 1: to them too. Sometimes those stores where they say that

808
00:43:09,719 --> 00:43:11,839
Speaker 1: they're hard to talk into it, but I always tell

809
00:43:11,920 --> 00:43:14,480
Speaker 1: them what happened at my store and what happens that

810
00:43:14,520 --> 00:43:16,840
Speaker 1: we had the same store manager for I believe like

811
00:43:16,920 --> 00:43:20,160
Speaker 1: five years. He was great. We loved him, he was cool,

812
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:23,200
Speaker 1: and when we unionized, it wasn't about him. It was

813
00:43:23,280 --> 00:43:25,839
Speaker 1: about the working conditions at our store and that upper

814
00:43:25,840 --> 00:43:28,520
Speaker 1: management had been giving us false promises and the things

815
00:43:28,560 --> 00:43:30,439
Speaker 1: that needed to be changed at our store were kind

816
00:43:30,440 --> 00:43:32,400
Speaker 1: of out of my store manager's hands, like that was

817
00:43:32,520 --> 00:43:34,680
Speaker 1: like above his vay grade, so he couldn't do much

818
00:43:34,680 --> 00:43:36,279
Speaker 1: about it. And we made it clear, like Joe, it's

819
00:43:36,280 --> 00:43:38,960
Speaker 1: not about you. You're great, we love you. UM gotta

820
00:43:39,000 --> 00:43:41,719
Speaker 1: do it, do you though, Sorry, buddy. UM. Then we

821
00:43:41,800 --> 00:43:44,000
Speaker 1: got even though we loved Joe, we got a new

822
00:43:44,080 --> 00:43:48,759
Speaker 1: store manager in mid June, and she was a little

823
00:43:48,760 --> 00:43:52,000
Speaker 1: bit less awesome. And you know, you never know when

824
00:43:52,040 --> 00:43:53,960
Speaker 1: things that your store can change. And even if you

825
00:43:54,000 --> 00:43:55,880
Speaker 1: love the store manager you have now, they could they

826
00:43:55,880 --> 00:43:59,520
Speaker 1: could leave tomorrow. So you gotta like, the only thing

827
00:43:59,560 --> 00:44:02,239
Speaker 1: that guaranteed your store manager isn't guaranteed to be at

828
00:44:02,239 --> 00:44:05,880
Speaker 1: your store forever. What is guaranteed is a contract, and

829
00:44:05,920 --> 00:44:08,560
Speaker 1: that's something that's really important. Sometimes it's hard to get

830
00:44:08,560 --> 00:44:11,200
Speaker 1: people to see the long term of it, though. UM.

831
00:44:11,239 --> 00:44:17,120
Speaker 1: Otherwise we're normally pretty successful. UM. We uh typically try

832
00:44:17,160 --> 00:44:19,440
Speaker 1: to get phone numbers at every store, reach out to

833
00:44:19,480 --> 00:44:21,200
Speaker 1: them within the next two days, and then we'll hold

834
00:44:21,239 --> 00:44:24,440
Speaker 1: like an intake meeting. So whenever we have an intake meeting,

835
00:44:24,440 --> 00:44:27,640
Speaker 1: we tell them make a spreadsheet of every partner at

836
00:44:27,640 --> 00:44:30,320
Speaker 1: your store, what shift they work, what their job is

837
00:44:30,400 --> 00:44:34,640
Speaker 1: like if they are strip supervisor or barista, and assign

838
00:44:34,840 --> 00:44:37,760
Speaker 1: one person on your organizing committee to talk to that person.

839
00:44:37,840 --> 00:44:39,920
Speaker 1: So every person at your store should have an organizing

840
00:44:39,920 --> 00:44:43,160
Speaker 1: committee member assigned to them. From there, once they have

841
00:44:43,200 --> 00:44:45,120
Speaker 1: a plan for who's going to talk to who, we

842
00:44:45,160 --> 00:44:47,120
Speaker 1: get cards to them and they can be either physical

843
00:44:47,160 --> 00:44:50,479
Speaker 1: cards like my store did, or digital cards, and then

844
00:44:51,000 --> 00:44:54,919
Speaker 1: they start getting signatures, having little conversations like hey, here's

845
00:44:54,920 --> 00:44:56,520
Speaker 1: what do you mean is here's why we're doing this.

846
00:44:56,800 --> 00:44:59,719
Speaker 1: If you agree, sign this card. Once they have sevent

847
00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:02,000
Speaker 1: cent of cards signed, then we take it to the

848
00:45:02,120 --> 00:45:03,960
Speaker 1: on l r V and say hello, we would like

849
00:45:04,000 --> 00:45:07,520
Speaker 1: to do a union please, and then hopefully they get

850
00:45:07,520 --> 00:45:11,400
Speaker 1: a valid count date. And the company always pushes for

851
00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:14,680
Speaker 1: in personal elections, we always push back. We pretty much

852
00:45:14,680 --> 00:45:18,480
Speaker 1: always win, and um we always want mail in ballots

853
00:45:18,480 --> 00:45:20,920
Speaker 1: because we do, like, really genuinely want everybody to be

854
00:45:21,000 --> 00:45:24,240
Speaker 1: able to vote. Whenever I was organizing at my store,

855
00:45:24,520 --> 00:45:28,480
Speaker 1: I told everyone my best possible outcome, best case scenario

856
00:45:28,880 --> 00:45:31,479
Speaker 1: is that every single person here votes and votes. Yes.

857
00:45:31,840 --> 00:45:34,880
Speaker 1: My second best possible outcome is that everyone here votes

858
00:45:34,960 --> 00:45:37,839
Speaker 1: and some of you vote. Now, like I I want

859
00:45:37,840 --> 00:45:40,479
Speaker 1: everyone to vote. I want every single person here to vote.

860
00:45:40,520 --> 00:45:43,640
Speaker 1: I don't want to be like there is one store

861
00:45:43,840 --> 00:45:46,360
Speaker 1: in my district that did end up winning their union election,

862
00:45:46,520 --> 00:45:49,640
Speaker 1: but out of there I think fifty to sixty partners,

863
00:45:50,080 --> 00:45:53,840
Speaker 1: only twelve people voted, and although they won, like, that

864
00:45:54,000 --> 00:45:55,719
Speaker 1: is not the way we wanted to get you want

865
00:45:55,719 --> 00:45:58,680
Speaker 1: everyone to have a day, yeah, which I think is

866
00:45:58,719 --> 00:46:01,640
Speaker 1: interesting on sort of two levels. One, it's like you

867
00:46:01,680 --> 00:46:04,680
Speaker 1: can see the exact moment at which corporations start carrying

868
00:46:04,719 --> 00:46:08,000
Speaker 1: about Prince are pretending to care about democracy, which is like,

869
00:46:08,360 --> 00:46:11,279
Speaker 1: oh wait, hold on, our workers are doing stuff. Oh no,

870
00:46:11,320 --> 00:46:13,560
Speaker 1: we have to care about Yeah. Suddenly we're like this

871
00:46:13,600 --> 00:46:16,239
Speaker 1: incredible pro democratic force we want everyone to have to say.

872
00:46:16,280 --> 00:46:20,839
Speaker 1: It's like, okay, it's funny. They actually just came out

873
00:46:20,920 --> 00:46:24,320
Speaker 1: with this happened after I got fired. That happened in

874
00:46:24,320 --> 00:46:26,759
Speaker 1: the past two weeks. But they came out with I

875
00:46:26,840 --> 00:46:30,560
Speaker 1: believe It's an app where partners can share their feedback

876
00:46:30,600 --> 00:46:35,160
Speaker 1: and share their experiences. Um. So they are trying to

877
00:46:35,160 --> 00:46:37,760
Speaker 1: be so democratic, Like, look at them just really listening

878
00:46:37,760 --> 00:46:43,280
Speaker 1: to us. Um. Yeah. They also did this really fun

879
00:46:43,360 --> 00:46:46,880
Speaker 1: thing where even though hours are being cut across the company,

880
00:46:46,960 --> 00:46:50,160
Speaker 1: people are having their hours drastically cut because this poor

881
00:46:50,239 --> 00:46:53,799
Speaker 1: little billion dollar corporation can't afford to schedule us any

882
00:46:53,800 --> 00:46:56,879
Speaker 1: more hours or properly staff their stores. We were all

883
00:46:56,920 --> 00:47:00,319
Speaker 1: scheduled an extra hour for one of our ships during

884
00:47:00,360 --> 00:47:02,560
Speaker 1: the week so that we could sit down and watch

885
00:47:02,640 --> 00:47:06,400
Speaker 1: an hour long speech by Howard Shoulder do a survey

886
00:47:06,440 --> 00:47:10,840
Speaker 1: about how much we like our job, which was funny.

887
00:47:10,960 --> 00:47:13,600
Speaker 1: That Wow, that was like a kind of a new

888
00:47:13,640 --> 00:47:16,799
Speaker 1: load for Starbucks. Like wow, there's two people working on

889
00:47:16,840 --> 00:47:19,359
Speaker 1: the floor right now, one person like making drinks and

890
00:47:19,600 --> 00:47:21,919
Speaker 1: one person on register and they're getting slammed out there.

891
00:47:22,200 --> 00:47:24,320
Speaker 1: It's so glad you guys had the had the labor

892
00:47:24,360 --> 00:47:26,040
Speaker 1: hours to be able to schedule me to sit here

893
00:47:26,040 --> 00:47:32,640
Speaker 1: and watch this Howard speech. Great. Thanks, Like I think,

894
00:47:32,680 --> 00:47:36,239
Speaker 1: like just the scheduling stuff like that, everyone being consistently understaffed.

895
00:47:36,440 --> 00:47:38,799
Speaker 1: It's like this is something I was talking to the

896
00:47:38,800 --> 00:47:41,759
Speaker 1: plant parenthood people about two, which is like like there too.

897
00:47:41,800 --> 00:47:44,959
Speaker 1: It's like you get you get these managers who are like, wow, okay,

898
00:47:44,960 --> 00:47:47,359
Speaker 1: we're gonna do cost cutting. We're doing and you know

899
00:47:47,840 --> 00:47:49,759
Speaker 1: the price of cost cutting is we're gonna just make

900
00:47:49,800 --> 00:47:53,000
Speaker 1: all of our people work can possibly hard because we

901
00:47:53,000 --> 00:47:55,520
Speaker 1: refused to put enough people in the store. And then

902
00:47:56,320 --> 00:47:58,000
Speaker 1: you know, we're we're we're we're not going to let

903
00:47:58,040 --> 00:47:59,680
Speaker 1: you work long enough, like we're not gonna let you

904
00:47:59,760 --> 00:48:01,839
Speaker 1: work long enough to actually get benefits. And then yeah,

905
00:48:01,880 --> 00:48:04,480
Speaker 1: it's like the worst combination. Yeah, but but it's like

906
00:48:04,480 --> 00:48:06,160
Speaker 1: you know, okay, you know, like like they have the buddy,

907
00:48:06,200 --> 00:48:08,560
Speaker 1: they can't schedule you. It's like, yeah, what I mean,

908
00:48:08,600 --> 00:48:10,279
Speaker 1: like like you know, I think like it ideally, in

909
00:48:10,280 --> 00:48:13,120
Speaker 1: a society that wasn't just like like not even not

910
00:48:13,200 --> 00:48:15,120
Speaker 1: even like a perfect sidey, in a society that was

911
00:48:15,200 --> 00:48:18,920
Speaker 1: not like entirely based on cruelty and violence, it wouldn't

912
00:48:18,920 --> 00:48:20,279
Speaker 1: even be able to do this at all. Everyone would

913
00:48:20,280 --> 00:48:23,920
Speaker 1: just have a fixed schedule. Yeah, just like exactly, because

914
00:48:24,040 --> 00:48:26,799
Speaker 1: it's so it sucks so much because it's like I

915
00:48:26,840 --> 00:48:28,799
Speaker 1: barely get to go to work even though I asked

916
00:48:28,840 --> 00:48:31,200
Speaker 1: for a full time I'm scheduled seventeen hours a week,

917
00:48:31,640 --> 00:48:35,600
Speaker 1: but I am there. I'm like so freaking stressed because

918
00:48:35,640 --> 00:48:38,160
Speaker 1: there's just not enough people to make the number of

919
00:48:38,239 --> 00:48:40,680
Speaker 1: drinks that need made, and all the customers are super

920
00:48:40,719 --> 00:48:43,520
Speaker 1: piste off because they've been waiting ten minutes for their drink,

921
00:48:44,080 --> 00:48:47,960
Speaker 1: and like corporate is just watching this happen. I'm sure

922
00:48:47,760 --> 00:48:50,560
Speaker 1: that they have to be getting bad reviews, Like there's

923
00:48:50,600 --> 00:48:53,160
Speaker 1: no way people aren't calling corporate to complain about the

924
00:48:53,160 --> 00:48:55,360
Speaker 1: weight times because there's only two of us working on

925
00:48:55,400 --> 00:48:58,360
Speaker 1: a Sunday morning, and like they're really just shooting themselves

926
00:48:58,360 --> 00:49:01,280
Speaker 1: in the foot, just all around, all around, shooting themselves

927
00:49:01,280 --> 00:49:03,200
Speaker 1: on the foot. Yeah. But I think also like there's

928
00:49:03,239 --> 00:49:06,600
Speaker 1: a part of this which is just like they are

929
00:49:06,640 --> 00:49:08,680
Speaker 1: insulated from this, like you know, I don't know, it's

930
00:49:08,680 --> 00:49:10,480
Speaker 1: like the managers don't have to deal with this ship

931
00:49:10,560 --> 00:49:12,440
Speaker 1: and it's like, yeah, they're gonna they're just gonna throw

932
00:49:12,520 --> 00:49:15,600
Speaker 1: all of the angry customers, Like people who are angry

933
00:49:15,640 --> 00:49:17,520
Speaker 1: because of decisions of management do they throwat you? And

934
00:49:17,560 --> 00:49:20,799
Speaker 1: it's like this is this is fucking bullshit, Like yeah,

935
00:49:20,960 --> 00:49:22,960
Speaker 1: it's like here's a cupe on for a free drink,

936
00:49:23,000 --> 00:49:28,920
Speaker 1: Go bully the brist does again. Yeah. Yeah, it's like Michelle,

937
00:49:29,000 --> 00:49:30,839
Speaker 1: my district manager, doesn't have to come in and deal

938
00:49:30,880 --> 00:49:33,600
Speaker 1: with like forty angry customers staring at her while she

939
00:49:33,640 --> 00:49:39,360
Speaker 1: tries to frantically make drinks. Like yeah, it's like I

940
00:49:39,360 --> 00:49:44,040
Speaker 1: don't know, like there is definitely a part of me

941
00:49:44,200 --> 00:49:47,160
Speaker 1: that is like I mean, okay, like I know, on

942
00:49:47,239 --> 00:49:49,000
Speaker 1: the one hand, this isn't true because there have been

943
00:49:49,000 --> 00:49:51,239
Speaker 1: a lot of terrible corporate people. There's been a lot

944
00:49:51,280 --> 00:49:53,560
Speaker 1: of like I don't know, like terrible world leaders who

945
00:49:53,600 --> 00:49:57,520
Speaker 1: actually had to work real jobs. But like, okay, like

946
00:49:59,520 --> 00:50:02,040
Speaker 1: like some part of my soul still holds onto the

947
00:50:02,040 --> 00:50:04,080
Speaker 1: belief that if like these people actually had to work

948
00:50:04,120 --> 00:50:08,480
Speaker 1: in these conditions like consistently, that it wouldn't be like

949
00:50:08,560 --> 00:50:12,000
Speaker 1: this because they wouldn't be completely insulated from just the

950
00:50:12,000 --> 00:50:14,560
Speaker 1: absolute horror they're inflicting an iPhone. And it's, yeah, you

951
00:50:14,600 --> 00:50:17,520
Speaker 1: can see whenever my store manager is scheduled to be

952
00:50:17,600 --> 00:50:20,080
Speaker 1: on the floor, like scheduled for a coverage shift, which

953
00:50:20,080 --> 00:50:21,799
Speaker 1: means that they're required to be out on the floor

954
00:50:21,840 --> 00:50:25,719
Speaker 1: making drinks and doing register, they were always very fully staffed.

955
00:50:25,920 --> 00:50:29,440
Speaker 1: Whenever whenever the man is scheduled for coverage, there's always

956
00:50:29,480 --> 00:50:32,200
Speaker 1: at least five other people on the floor. But whenever

957
00:50:32,239 --> 00:50:34,799
Speaker 1: it's like me on a Sunday morning opening the store

958
00:50:35,360 --> 00:50:37,840
Speaker 1: and there's like a Steelers game and a convention in

959
00:50:37,920 --> 00:50:40,600
Speaker 1: town and everyone, like the city is packed, and all

960
00:50:40,600 --> 00:50:43,560
Speaker 1: the hotels around around my store are packed. Everyone's gonna

961
00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:47,239
Speaker 1: want coffee. There's like three of us, which is just

962
00:50:47,280 --> 00:50:50,759
Speaker 1: like it's really frustrating to sort of like on a

963
00:50:50,800 --> 00:50:53,600
Speaker 1: political level, it's like every job that I've ever worked,

964
00:50:53,760 --> 00:50:56,080
Speaker 1: it's like if it was literally just us running this

965
00:50:56,080 --> 00:50:57,799
Speaker 1: and there was no management, everything would work a hunter

966
00:50:57,880 --> 00:51:02,040
Speaker 1: times better. Yeah, and it's like yeah, that's yeah, it's

967
00:51:02,120 --> 00:51:06,040
Speaker 1: like okay, Like at a certain point you have to

968
00:51:06,120 --> 00:51:09,400
Speaker 1: just be like get rid of these people, like what

969
00:51:09,760 --> 00:51:13,440
Speaker 1: why why why are we doing this our new new

970
00:51:13,600 --> 00:51:17,120
Speaker 1: store manager since our recent new one quit because working

971
00:51:17,200 --> 00:51:19,640
Speaker 1: visions are so bad. Our new new one is an

972
00:51:19,640 --> 00:51:22,760
Speaker 1: outside hire who doesn't know how to ring in drinks,

973
00:51:23,200 --> 00:51:25,960
Speaker 1: you know, how to make drinks, doesn't know anything, and

974
00:51:26,040 --> 00:51:28,400
Speaker 1: they just put him in my store as a store manager.

975
00:51:28,680 --> 00:51:31,120
Speaker 1: And my roommate is also a barista, and she's been

976
00:51:31,160 --> 00:51:33,200
Speaker 1: like having to coach him every day, which is a

977
00:51:33,239 --> 00:51:36,040
Speaker 1: really awkward situation because she's not even a supervisor. She's

978
00:51:36,040 --> 00:51:38,280
Speaker 1: like a a barista and she has to be like, hey,

979
00:51:38,320 --> 00:51:41,239
Speaker 1: there's a difference between nitro coold Brew and regular coold Brew,

980
00:51:41,360 --> 00:51:44,880
Speaker 1: like keep putting the wrong button. Very frustrating when they

981
00:51:44,880 --> 00:51:47,440
Speaker 1: sent this guy into run my store. Meanwhile, like he

982
00:51:47,760 --> 00:51:50,120
Speaker 1: probably knows less than everybody else that works there. Yeah,

983
00:51:50,200 --> 00:51:54,399
Speaker 1: definitely knows you do, like, yeah, definitely knows less than me.

984
00:51:54,719 --> 00:51:57,400
Speaker 1: It's so funny. Since I've been fired, I still like

985
00:51:57,440 --> 00:52:00,600
Speaker 1: every time there's an emergency at my store, my barristas

986
00:52:00,680 --> 00:52:04,560
Speaker 1: called me. It's wild. Like I got a call at

987
00:52:04,600 --> 00:52:06,239
Speaker 1: five in the morning the other day from one of

988
00:52:06,280 --> 00:52:09,319
Speaker 1: my favorite barristas and he was like, hey, Tori, I

989
00:52:09,360 --> 00:52:12,600
Speaker 1: know you don't work here anymore, but sal was supposed

990
00:52:12,600 --> 00:52:14,359
Speaker 1: to open and he's not here yet and I'm locked

991
00:52:14,400 --> 00:52:17,160
Speaker 1: out of the store. What do I do? Or Like

992
00:52:17,200 --> 00:52:18,960
Speaker 1: another barrista called me when I was in d C.

993
00:52:19,080 --> 00:52:20,680
Speaker 1: And he was like, Tori, I just shrote up for

994
00:52:20,680 --> 00:52:23,120
Speaker 1: work and the store is closed. What do I do?

995
00:52:23,360 --> 00:52:26,640
Speaker 1: And I was like, I don't know that I can

996
00:52:26,680 --> 00:52:31,000
Speaker 1: do my best to help you, but I there's not

997
00:52:31,080 --> 00:52:35,280
Speaker 1: much I can physically do. I don't have keys anymore. Sorry. Yeah,

998
00:52:35,360 --> 00:52:38,279
Speaker 1: And it's it's really like, you know, one of one

999
00:52:38,280 --> 00:52:40,319
Speaker 1: of the things that I mean, I guess you get

1000
00:52:40,320 --> 00:52:42,080
Speaker 1: this in both sort of like like when I want

1001
00:52:42,080 --> 00:52:45,400
Speaker 1: to like so I went to the rist of Chicago,

1002
00:52:45,600 --> 00:52:47,200
Speaker 1: and you know, it's like, okay, so these are the

1003
00:52:47,200 --> 00:52:49,840
Speaker 1: people who infamously produced all of the terrible economics to

1004
00:52:49,880 --> 00:52:51,680
Speaker 1: make the world suck, right and it's like, okay, well

1005
00:52:51,680 --> 00:52:54,400
Speaker 1: you take econ classes there, and it's like everything is

1006
00:52:54,440 --> 00:52:57,719
Speaker 1: about sort of like I like, you're doing all of

1007
00:52:57,760 --> 00:53:02,399
Speaker 1: this because I like, okay, so like the you're doing

1008
00:53:02,400 --> 00:53:03,839
Speaker 1: all of this under the assumption that if you let

1009
00:53:03,840 --> 00:53:06,200
Speaker 1: corporations run into free market, they will do everything optimally

1010
00:53:06,200 --> 00:53:07,759
Speaker 1: and they will produce the lowest prices and they will

1011
00:53:07,880 --> 00:53:09,919
Speaker 1: produce everything as efficiently as possible. And it's funny because

1012
00:53:09,920 --> 00:53:11,440
Speaker 1: like you see this in Marxist theory too. And then

1013
00:53:11,480 --> 00:53:13,680
Speaker 1: it's like you look at like any store place and

1014
00:53:13,680 --> 00:53:16,040
Speaker 1: it's like no, no, no, they're firing their most competent

1015
00:53:16,120 --> 00:53:19,000
Speaker 1: workers and hiring people who are incompetent because like because

1016
00:53:19,040 --> 00:53:21,760
Speaker 1: the thing that they actually like care them most about,

1017
00:53:21,840 --> 00:53:24,680
Speaker 1: even more than efficiency, even more than like making more money,

1018
00:53:24,920 --> 00:53:32,799
Speaker 1: is maintaining their power. And it's like it's something that

1019
00:53:32,840 --> 00:53:38,040
Speaker 1: like is really obvious when you're working, but somehow, like

1020
00:53:39,000 --> 00:53:41,320
Speaker 1: the people who write about this stuff has like deluded

1021
00:53:41,320 --> 00:53:44,880
Speaker 1: themselves into not being able to understand Yeah, that's no idea.

1022
00:53:45,000 --> 00:53:48,160
Speaker 1: It's like it feels like they almost don't want the

1023
00:53:48,200 --> 00:53:51,600
Speaker 1: experienced workers to say I've seen like so part of

1024
00:53:51,600 --> 00:53:54,920
Speaker 1: my internship project is keeping a database of the fired

1025
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:57,000
Speaker 1: partners in the anti union firings, which is kind of

1026
00:53:57,000 --> 00:53:59,360
Speaker 1: ironic because I was like, well, got to add myself

1027
00:53:59,360 --> 00:54:03,160
Speaker 1: to this, but she now, But I've seen I see

1028
00:54:03,200 --> 00:54:05,600
Speaker 1: people must French treat who worked the company for five years.

1029
00:54:05,600 --> 00:54:08,120
Speaker 1: There's one person on there who worked for the company

1030
00:54:08,160 --> 00:54:12,160
Speaker 1: for seventeen years. But we don't get raises or anything

1031
00:54:12,280 --> 00:54:15,200
Speaker 1: for seniority or anything like that. There's actually a cap

1032
00:54:15,400 --> 00:54:17,400
Speaker 1: on how much you can make in each state from

1033
00:54:17,440 --> 00:54:20,279
Speaker 1: Starbucks because they don't they don't want you to work

1034
00:54:20,320 --> 00:54:23,160
Speaker 1: there forever because then the frustrations start to come through,

1035
00:54:23,680 --> 00:54:26,880
Speaker 1: and then new the new unionized, and it feels like

1036
00:54:26,920 --> 00:54:31,640
Speaker 1: they the high turnover feels really intentional. Sometimes I think

1037
00:54:31,680 --> 00:54:33,839
Speaker 1: it is, like I think that that's that's like a

1038
00:54:33,840 --> 00:54:36,360
Speaker 1: pretty common like Amazon Justice too, where it's like like

1039
00:54:36,440 --> 00:54:39,800
Speaker 1: their whole their their whole business strategies is intentionally on

1040
00:54:40,080 --> 00:54:41,640
Speaker 1: working every one so hard if they quit so I

1041
00:54:41,680 --> 00:54:43,239
Speaker 1: can get a new group of people, and so people

1042
00:54:43,239 --> 00:54:47,600
Speaker 1: don't organize and it's yeah, yeah, it's really brutal and

1043
00:54:48,280 --> 00:54:52,319
Speaker 1: horrific and I hate these people. Yeah, same, It's like

1044
00:54:52,360 --> 00:54:54,759
Speaker 1: if I see this person here for ten years and

1045
00:54:54,840 --> 00:54:58,279
Speaker 1: make this look like it's a sustainable career. Then then

1046
00:54:58,320 --> 00:55:00,880
Speaker 1: we have to make it a sustainable career, and I

1047
00:55:00,880 --> 00:55:03,440
Speaker 1: don't want to do that. So it works people out

1048
00:55:03,480 --> 00:55:08,080
Speaker 1: after like two or three, so very frustrating, which I

1049
00:55:08,160 --> 00:55:10,000
Speaker 1: think I guess also helps them with the sort of

1050
00:55:10,080 --> 00:55:13,160
Speaker 1: like like the way that people look at like I

1051
00:55:13,160 --> 00:55:15,359
Speaker 1: mean minium wage workers and also just service workers in general,

1052
00:55:15,440 --> 00:55:17,080
Speaker 1: where they're like, oh, well, yeah, you know, we don't

1053
00:55:17,080 --> 00:55:18,920
Speaker 1: need to raise minium wages a bunch of teenagers, Like

1054
00:55:18,960 --> 00:55:21,480
Speaker 1: these people don't need like good wages because this is like,

1055
00:55:21,560 --> 00:55:23,000
Speaker 1: you know, you're not actually supposed to be doing this,

1056
00:55:23,000 --> 00:55:25,759
Speaker 1: this is like a transition thing. It's like that's not

1057
00:55:25,800 --> 00:55:28,640
Speaker 1: how any of this works, Like it's just not that's

1058
00:55:28,680 --> 00:55:34,839
Speaker 1: just you're you're you're making excuses for corporations doing exploitation. Yeah, absolutely, absolutely, Yeah.

1059
00:55:34,840 --> 00:55:36,520
Speaker 1: And it also seems like another thing they're doing is

1060
00:55:36,560 --> 00:55:40,040
Speaker 1: that we've seen a lot of really high manager turnover too,

1061
00:55:40,800 --> 00:55:44,680
Speaker 1: and I think that also is really intentional because they

1062
00:55:44,719 --> 00:55:48,120
Speaker 1: had to even though the store manager that ultimately fired

1063
00:55:48,160 --> 00:55:52,279
Speaker 1: me was new, like she couldn't she didn't even have

1064
00:55:52,320 --> 00:55:54,600
Speaker 1: the heart to do that. She had to bring in

1065
00:55:54,640 --> 00:55:56,319
Speaker 1: They had to bring in a support manager to like

1066
00:55:56,360 --> 00:55:59,880
Speaker 1: actually say the words like you're fired. Here's your termination notice.

1067
00:56:00,440 --> 00:56:03,080
Speaker 1: And it feels like the reason they're making the managers

1068
00:56:03,160 --> 00:56:05,640
Speaker 1: anniverse so high is so that the managers don't like

1069
00:56:05,680 --> 00:56:08,600
Speaker 1: form those relationships with staff of the store because it

1070
00:56:08,640 --> 00:56:10,840
Speaker 1: doesn't feel as bad to fire them. Like, I don't

1071
00:56:10,840 --> 00:56:13,319
Speaker 1: think this ever would have happened to me if my

1072
00:56:13,400 --> 00:56:15,840
Speaker 1: original store manager, who had been there for five years

1073
00:56:16,000 --> 00:56:18,760
Speaker 1: and like knew me personally, was still at my store,

1074
00:56:18,800 --> 00:56:20,440
Speaker 1: I don't think this would have happened. And I think

1075
00:56:20,440 --> 00:56:22,799
Speaker 1: that's why they're doing this big manager shuffle right now

1076
00:56:23,200 --> 00:56:25,440
Speaker 1: at least. I mean, I'm sure it's happening in other places.

1077
00:56:25,480 --> 00:56:27,880
Speaker 1: It's definitely happening a lot in Pittsburgh. I think there

1078
00:56:27,880 --> 00:56:30,360
Speaker 1: are very few stores in my district that had the

1079
00:56:30,400 --> 00:56:33,840
Speaker 1: same manager that they had three months ago. It feels

1080
00:56:33,880 --> 00:56:36,440
Speaker 1: like they're intentionally shuffling them around so they don't form

1081
00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:39,800
Speaker 1: like personal relationships or any sort of emotional tie to

1082
00:56:39,840 --> 00:56:42,440
Speaker 1: the partners at their store, and they don't feel guilty

1083
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:45,360
Speaker 1: firing them. Yeah, it's like it's community is really dangerous

1084
00:56:45,360 --> 00:56:48,719
Speaker 1: to them. M absolutely, Like I think I talked about

1085
00:56:48,719 --> 00:56:54,799
Speaker 1: this like some number of episodes ago, but like, yeah,

1086
00:56:54,840 --> 00:56:57,280
Speaker 1: like this is this is the thing that's really common

1087
00:56:57,480 --> 00:57:01,200
Speaker 1: with like IM but I'm just I'm just gonna straight

1088
00:57:01,280 --> 00:57:05,520
Speaker 1: up called Starbucks dicatorial organization because it is, like it

1089
00:57:05,640 --> 00:57:07,360
Speaker 1: is just a dictatorship. It's like the tatorships do this

1090
00:57:07,400 --> 00:57:11,000
Speaker 1: a lot where like, yeah, like communities are really dangerous

1091
00:57:11,000 --> 00:57:13,080
Speaker 1: to them. Communities with any kind of strong bonds with

1092
00:57:13,080 --> 00:57:15,239
Speaker 1: each other really dangerous because people will fight for each other,

1093
00:57:15,680 --> 00:57:19,000
Speaker 1: and you know, you can't for example, like I don't know,

1094
00:57:19,040 --> 00:57:22,080
Speaker 1: it's it's really really hard to support someone who has

1095
00:57:22,120 --> 00:57:23,960
Speaker 1: a strong community around them that will fight back. But

1096
00:57:23,960 --> 00:57:27,480
Speaker 1: if you can isolate those people, if you can like

1097
00:57:27,480 --> 00:57:30,600
Speaker 1: like physically isolate them, if you can like socially isolate them,

1098
00:57:30,600 --> 00:57:31,880
Speaker 1: if you can make sure that they don't have the

1099
00:57:31,920 --> 00:57:33,720
Speaker 1: support networks, then you can then you can you know,

1100
00:57:33,800 --> 00:57:37,080
Speaker 1: do whatever you want to them. And that seems Yeah,

1101
00:57:37,080 --> 00:57:41,480
Speaker 1: it seems like it's it's a very deliberate like and everything.

1102
00:57:41,480 --> 00:57:42,919
Speaker 1: It's like you know this also like this just makes

1103
00:57:42,960 --> 00:57:46,320
Speaker 1: everyone's life worse, right, Like did you see what happened

1104
00:57:46,360 --> 00:57:51,000
Speaker 1: in Seattle with the new Starbucks Heritage District. I think

1105
00:57:51,040 --> 00:57:54,560
Speaker 1: I've vaguely heard about it, but yeah, so in Seattle,

1106
00:57:54,920 --> 00:57:58,480
Speaker 1: the three like original I believe it's the three original

1107
00:57:58,560 --> 00:58:01,200
Speaker 1: Starbucks stores, like first ever Starbucks stores to open the

1108
00:58:01,240 --> 00:58:04,840
Speaker 1: free in Seattle. Um, they've made it so that you

1109
00:58:04,920 --> 00:58:08,360
Speaker 1: don't the partners there don't have a specific store that

1110
00:58:08,360 --> 00:58:11,480
Speaker 1: they're assigned to. They're assigned to the district and can

1111
00:58:11,520 --> 00:58:14,520
Speaker 1: be scheduled at any store at any time, So you're

1112
00:58:14,560 --> 00:58:16,960
Speaker 1: not working with the same people all the time and

1113
00:58:17,040 --> 00:58:20,160
Speaker 1: you're not forming those relationships. And if you were to

1114
00:58:20,280 --> 00:58:25,480
Speaker 1: somehow forming a relationships to start organizing, UM, you wouldn't

1115
00:58:25,480 --> 00:58:26,680
Speaker 1: be able to vote as a store. You have to

1116
00:58:26,760 --> 00:58:29,600
Speaker 1: vote as a district, which is just a lot more

1117
00:58:29,640 --> 00:58:33,560
Speaker 1: logistically difficult. And there was a lot of pushback that happened,

1118
00:58:33,600 --> 00:58:37,040
Speaker 1: but unfortunately those stores hadn't filed for an election yet

1119
00:58:37,480 --> 00:58:39,560
Speaker 1: and UM weren't really able to do much about it.

1120
00:58:40,200 --> 00:58:42,560
Speaker 1: But we're definitely scared of that happening, like in Pittsburgh

1121
00:58:42,680 --> 00:58:44,680
Speaker 1: and like at other Starbuck stores around the country, that

1122
00:58:44,720 --> 00:58:45,880
Speaker 1: they're going to make it so that you work for

1123
00:58:45,920 --> 00:58:49,360
Speaker 1: the district the specific store, and that's kind of terrifying.

1124
00:58:49,680 --> 00:58:52,360
Speaker 1: So yeah, I mean, and I think that that's not

1125
00:58:52,360 --> 00:58:54,200
Speaker 1: everything where it's like okay that they have to have

1126
00:58:54,240 --> 00:58:57,360
Speaker 1: to weigh efficiency versus like their own power and they're

1127
00:58:57,360 --> 00:59:00,160
Speaker 1: going to choose their own power every time, and as

1128
00:59:00,640 --> 00:59:03,200
Speaker 1: like there's just like an aspect of that too where

1129
00:59:03,200 --> 00:59:08,640
Speaker 1: it's like they're just incredible dehumanization of it. Yeah, it's

1130
00:59:08,640 --> 00:59:11,600
Speaker 1: just totally it's like really careless, like you don't know

1131
00:59:12,240 --> 00:59:15,880
Speaker 1: what someone's transportation situation looks like. Um, you don't know,

1132
00:59:16,000 --> 00:59:19,560
Speaker 1: like if they feel comfortable working with like different groups

1133
00:59:19,560 --> 00:59:21,280
Speaker 1: of people, Like I don't know, I know that like

1134
00:59:21,320 --> 00:59:25,520
Speaker 1: a lot of people at UM. So this is just

1135
00:59:25,560 --> 00:59:27,120
Speaker 1: reminding me of something that happened at the store in

1136
00:59:27,120 --> 00:59:29,560
Speaker 1: my area. So at Penn Center East, the Penn Center

1137
00:59:29,560 --> 00:59:31,840
Speaker 1: East Starbucks, they are union store. They decided they were

1138
00:59:31,840 --> 00:59:35,240
Speaker 1: closing Penn Center East for like a for an entire

1139
00:59:35,320 --> 00:59:38,000
Speaker 1: week and gave them the option to work at three

1140
00:59:38,040 --> 00:59:41,040
Speaker 1: stores that were like an hour away from them. And

1141
00:59:41,760 --> 00:59:43,640
Speaker 1: of course, like they were only given the option to

1142
00:59:43,640 --> 00:59:45,520
Speaker 1: work at other stores that were unionized, they weren't going

1143
00:59:45,560 --> 00:59:47,560
Speaker 1: to send the union people into the non unionized store

1144
00:59:48,000 --> 00:59:51,760
Speaker 1: potentially influenced them. So one of the partners, the one

1145
00:59:51,760 --> 00:59:53,520
Speaker 1: that was actually fired yesterday, it was like, I do

1146
00:59:53,560 --> 00:59:56,560
Speaker 1: not feel comfortable working at this store because I worked

1147
00:59:56,560 --> 01:00:00,240
Speaker 1: at the store at one time. And I they still

1148
01:00:00,240 --> 01:00:02,680
Speaker 1: a lot of discrimination from the from the manager there,

1149
01:00:02,720 --> 01:00:04,760
Speaker 1: from the partners there, and I don't want to be

1150
01:00:04,760 --> 01:00:07,680
Speaker 1: put in that situation again. There's like a customer at

1151
01:00:07,720 --> 01:00:10,520
Speaker 1: this other store that said that called me a racial slur,

1152
01:00:10,680 --> 01:00:12,480
Speaker 1: and I don't want to be in this area. I

1153
01:00:12,520 --> 01:00:14,560
Speaker 1: don't I don't want to go out to these stores.

1154
01:00:14,880 --> 01:00:16,880
Speaker 1: And it just like exposes partners to like a lot

1155
01:00:16,920 --> 01:00:19,560
Speaker 1: more like situations that they're potentially not comfortable with there,

1156
01:00:19,600 --> 01:00:22,120
Speaker 1: with new managers that they don't have like a good

1157
01:00:22,160 --> 01:00:25,760
Speaker 1: rapport with yet, And it makes everything just a lot

1158
01:00:25,800 --> 01:00:28,080
Speaker 1: more difficult. Like just let everyone work at their own store,

1159
01:00:28,320 --> 01:00:30,280
Speaker 1: Like we all have friends. All the partners that, like

1160
01:00:30,360 --> 01:00:32,680
Speaker 1: my store at least were very very close. I know

1161
01:00:32,720 --> 01:00:34,720
Speaker 1: a lot of the stores are the same way. It

1162
01:00:34,880 --> 01:00:37,960
Speaker 1: just makes work worse to not be working with your friends.

1163
01:00:38,880 --> 01:00:41,280
Speaker 1: I don't think anyone would work in Market Square if

1164
01:00:41,320 --> 01:00:47,240
Speaker 1: we weren't all really close with each other. Um, overall,

1165
01:00:47,320 --> 01:00:50,560
Speaker 1: just work situation. Yeah, And I don't know, hope, hope,

1166
01:00:50,600 --> 01:00:52,800
Speaker 1: hopefully they're not able to do that on a large scale,

1167
01:00:52,840 --> 01:00:57,200
Speaker 1: because yeah, yeah, that would be it just feels like

1168
01:00:57,240 --> 01:01:01,680
Speaker 1: a disaster, especially since I mean there's a lot of

1169
01:01:01,680 --> 01:01:04,080
Speaker 1: Starbucks stores like concentrated in cities, but I know, like

1170
01:01:04,080 --> 01:01:07,320
Speaker 1: the Penn's Center East Starbucks was kind of out there

1171
01:01:07,320 --> 01:01:10,800
Speaker 1: in the suburbs. And another big issue that they faced

1172
01:01:10,880 --> 01:01:13,160
Speaker 1: was that like, we don't have some of us don't

1173
01:01:13,200 --> 01:01:16,320
Speaker 1: have cars, and we just can't get to like the

1174
01:01:16,400 --> 01:01:18,840
Speaker 1: city Starbucks stores because our parents drive us to work

1175
01:01:18,880 --> 01:01:20,880
Speaker 1: to our parents drive us to work every day because

1176
01:01:20,920 --> 01:01:23,160
Speaker 1: we're in high school, and we just don't have like

1177
01:01:23,160 --> 01:01:25,960
Speaker 1: a means of transportation. There's nowhere to park there and

1178
01:01:26,120 --> 01:01:28,400
Speaker 1: just puts them. It just makes them face a lot

1179
01:01:28,400 --> 01:01:30,720
Speaker 1: of issues that they weren't really planned on dealing with,

1180
01:01:30,840 --> 01:01:34,240
Speaker 1: planning on dealing with, and aren't really prepared to. And

1181
01:01:34,640 --> 01:01:36,720
Speaker 1: they probably chose the store that they currently work at

1182
01:01:37,120 --> 01:01:39,720
Speaker 1: because like they didn't just pick it at random. They

1183
01:01:39,760 --> 01:01:41,720
Speaker 1: picked because it was convenient to get to, They like

1184
01:01:41,920 --> 01:01:44,760
Speaker 1: vibes there and it was like a good fit for them.

1185
01:01:44,920 --> 01:01:47,960
Speaker 1: And forcing them to work at other other stores where

1186
01:01:47,960 --> 01:01:51,440
Speaker 1: there are a lot less comfortable not a good decision.

1187
01:01:51,720 --> 01:01:55,880
Speaker 1: Just feels shady, very humanizing for sure. Yeah, and so

1188
01:01:55,920 --> 01:01:57,840
Speaker 1: I guess I do. I do have phone messing to ask,

1189
01:01:57,840 --> 01:02:00,240
Speaker 1: which is if people want to support you and people

1190
01:02:00,280 --> 01:02:02,600
Speaker 1: want to find you in places where can they do that?

1191
01:02:03,280 --> 01:02:08,320
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, So my Twitter is Tory Underscore TIMBERLINI and

1192
01:02:08,360 --> 01:02:10,840
Speaker 1: that's my personal Twitter. We also have a Pittsburgh Starbucks

1193
01:02:10,880 --> 01:02:14,760
Speaker 1: Workers United Twitter account. Um, if you want to support

1194
01:02:14,760 --> 01:02:17,200
Speaker 1: me and Kim specifically, there is a link to our

1195
01:02:17,240 --> 01:02:19,600
Speaker 1: go fund me there. There's a link in my bio

1196
01:02:19,840 --> 01:02:24,400
Speaker 1: and somewhere in the Pittsburgh account as well. We also

1197
01:02:24,920 --> 01:02:29,560
Speaker 1: just released a national solidarity fund um through Coworker, but

1198
01:02:29,600 --> 01:02:33,600
Speaker 1: I'm actually not quite clear on how people can donate

1199
01:02:33,640 --> 01:02:35,800
Speaker 1: to that yet. I can, it's very new, so I

1200
01:02:35,800 --> 01:02:38,720
Speaker 1: can send you an email with a link to that. Yeah. Cool. Yeah,

1201
01:02:38,800 --> 01:02:41,840
Speaker 1: well we'll put all the links in the show notes. Awesome,

1202
01:02:42,160 --> 01:02:44,040
Speaker 1: thank you so much. Yeah, thank you, Thank you so

1203
01:02:44,120 --> 01:02:48,680
Speaker 1: much for joining us. Is Yeah, it was really good. Yeah,

1204
01:02:48,720 --> 01:02:51,200
Speaker 1: thank you so much for sharing my story. I I

1205
01:02:51,240 --> 01:02:54,360
Speaker 1: feel like there's a lot of fired partners, fired partners

1206
01:02:54,360 --> 01:02:56,320
Speaker 1: across the country, and like we all kind of need

1207
01:02:56,360 --> 01:02:58,320
Speaker 1: to stand together. And I like people to hear my

1208
01:02:58,360 --> 01:03:02,000
Speaker 1: story and hear about how the union has supported us,

1209
01:03:02,040 --> 01:03:04,120
Speaker 1: and there's been a lot of community support. And you know,

1210
01:03:04,440 --> 01:03:07,040
Speaker 1: as soon as I was fired, I was immediately hired

1211
01:03:07,160 --> 01:03:09,120
Speaker 1: by work with United. You know, they're really willing to

1212
01:03:09,120 --> 01:03:11,440
Speaker 1: take care of us. And if I had like anything

1213
01:03:11,640 --> 01:03:16,000
Speaker 1: to kind of like like any advice to give the

1214
01:03:16,000 --> 01:03:18,160
Speaker 1: partners who are trying to organize, Like, the union has

1215
01:03:18,160 --> 01:03:20,280
Speaker 1: your back, don't worry too much about losing your job.

1216
01:03:20,440 --> 01:03:22,880
Speaker 1: Probably won't happen. If it does, the union has your back,

1217
01:03:23,040 --> 01:03:27,160
Speaker 1: and all the other fire protters have your back as well. Thanks.

1218
01:03:27,440 --> 01:03:31,040
Speaker 1: Hell yeah yeah. And on that note, yeah, fight your

1219
01:03:31,040 --> 01:03:35,280
Speaker 1: bosses together. You can beat them. Uh yeah. Go out

1220
01:03:35,320 --> 01:03:38,800
Speaker 1: into the world and make havoc for people who do

1221
01:03:38,840 --> 01:03:46,920
Speaker 1: bad stuff, cause problems on purpose. It could Happen Here

1222
01:03:47,000 --> 01:03:49,600
Speaker 1: is a production of cool Zone Media. For more podcasts

1223
01:03:49,640 --> 01:03:52,240
Speaker 1: from cool Zone Media, visit our website cool zone media

1224
01:03:52,280 --> 01:03:54,080
Speaker 1: dot com or check us out on the I Heart

1225
01:03:54,160 --> 01:03:57,200
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

1226
01:03:57,720 --> 01:03:59,720
Speaker 1: You can find sources for it could Happen here. Update

1227
01:03:59,800 --> 01:04:03,120
Speaker 1: in my at cool zone media dot com slash sources.

1228
01:04:03,120 --> 01:04:03,960
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening.