Is this a silly idea or could it actually work?
not silly at all, but very very difficult without outside help. are you already in a union?
Have you ever unionized a place before? Do you know an established local you could reach out to? Are you able to be low key about it for a while so your ass doesn’t get canned for rabble rousing? Finally, can you talk to coworkers and become close with them before going full pinko union mode?
I fed like these are the questions to ask yourself before heading in. Also working at Starbucks sucks right now, with drive thrus and online ordering, you’ll be swamped. Prime radicalization hours, maybe, but you need to know what you’re getting in for
Ahh these are some very good questions, the kinda stuff I need to know but wouldn’t have even thought to ask.
I’ve never unionized a place before. But I think I would be good at talking to coworkers.
The job would be awful tho, I hadn’t actually thought about that. Idk if I’d even end up hanging around long enough to actually start the unionizing
Not sure if unions still do this but back in the day you could be a professional salt. Union would train you on how to do it and so on.
Not sure if unions still do this but back in the day you could be a professional salt.
Amazon unionisation efforts at JFK8 involved multiple salts working in coordination as a team with one another.
Salting is not only still something being done professionally but something that is expanding in the current labour movement, and quite sophisticated.
Peep anything by labor notes, like this, to learn more! https://labornotes.org/secrets
Ooh look https://libgen.is/book/index.php?md5=3852C26ECC48E858B4BDA0AA9C07ABED
As others have said, it’s called salting. It’s very gallant and cool.
But, it can take years to get a committee and a authorization vote. Maybe shorter for a local sbux, but you can’t just walk in with some red and black flags and say you wanna unionize. It takes time to earn people’s trust and time to get them to have faith that unionizing is worth the risk of losing their jobs.
You may not win a union, you may just get better pay and benefits and safety for your fellow workers as a concession and the union effort might dissolve because of it. That’s cool to get for your fellow workers but obviously, we have higher aims than pure economism and reformism - we don’t want a bigger, “fairer” slice of the pie we want the whole god damn thing and the knife the bourgeoisie used to cut it. It’s a big ask for workers without class consciousness but it’s possible to develop (and also we need it to overcome the challenges of poverty, war, and climate change as well) and you can be part of that by getting a union in your little local Starbucks for sure.
I wish I had gotten a job at a coffee shop. I would be so good at making coffee. Plus you get to meet people. Do it!
