ITHACA, N.Y. (Diya TV) — Starbucks is being ordered to reopen two stores in Ithaca, New York after a federal labor judge ruled that the giant coffee corporation illegally closed the locations to deter union activity. The decision comes after the National Labor Relations Board discovered that Starbucks had been violating the National Labor Relations Act by shuttering the stores in retaliation for workers’ efforts at forming a union.
Administrative law judge Geoffrey Carter, working for the NLRB, issued his decision Friday and found that Starbucks had “permanently closed its two remaining stores in Ithaca… for anti union reasons” and that it had failed to bargain collectively in good faith with the union, Workers United, that represents the employees. The stores must, according to the ruling of the judge, be reopened within “a reasonable period of time.”
The union filed an unfair labor practice charge with the NLRB after Starbucks shut down its Ithaca Commons and Meadow Street locations in May 2023. The stores were closed after all three Ithaca Starbucks voted to unionize in April 2022. According to sources, shortly after the union votes were held, regional leadership at Starbucks was talking about permanently shutting down the Meadow Street and Ithaca Commons locations because of high turnover and low profitability.
However, the NLRB decided that the loss in company profits also included the “walkouts” of employees and the financial impacts thereof. Carter’s ruling determined that Starbucks was targeting the unionized stores under an attempt to “chill unionism.”
This is not the first such order made against the coffee chain. The NLRB had also ordered Starbucks to reopen another location in the third Ithaca in July 2023 after having closed it in June 2022.
In response to the latest ruling, Starbucks released a statement saying that it was “reviewing the administrative law judge’s decision.” The company further added, “Our focus continues to be on training and supporting our managers to ensure respect of our partners’ rights to organize and on progressing negotiations towards ratified store contracts this year.”
To that end, Judge Carter also gave Starbucks leave to file additional evidence where it deems reopening the two stores to prove “unduly burdensome.” Until new evidence may be filed and disposed of, however, the order to reopen stands.
The Ithaca closings are part of a wider wave of labor disputes between Starbucks and Workers United, which got a boost in 2021 when employees at a store in Buffalo, New York, became the first in the nation to successfully unionize. Hundreds of locations throughout the country have voted since then to unionize, even if the Seattle-based company has pushed back.
The company has been to the NLRB and federal courts multiple times, with the court ruling against Starbucks on many labor practices, including delaying contract negotiations and withholding benefits from unionized workers. Last year, the NLRB ordered Starbucks to reopen 23 stores located across major U.S. cities, including Chicago, Portland, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, and Seattle, where the corporate headquarters is based.
The labor campaign at Starbucks has actually energized other sectors’ movements. Amazon, Hollywood, and auto industry workers did the same thing with protests and strikes, which also resonated through the rallying cry for better working conditions and labor rights.
In addition to labor disputes, Starbucks and Workers United are now entwined in others. This spring, the company filed suit against the union for copyright infringement, alleging that it had used the logo of the company. Just last week, though, both Starbucks and Workers United filed dueling lawsuits after a union post on social media read “Solidarity with Palestine!” in reaction to the October 7 attack by Hamas.
