“There’s been times when partners have come in and worn face masks to protect themselves from COVID-19, and [the district manager] says, ‘Oh, if you’re wearing a mask, you’re sick,’” Naomi recounted. “And I’ve seen him chew out workers on the floor and kick them off and short staffing us because they have union buttons, or because they have a union lanyard.”
A member of Starbucks Workers United at the Birmingham Starbucks on 20th Street, Naomi related several similar incidents during an interview with APR on Thursday, describing them as part of a general anti-union campaign. APR has previously spoken to her about being a member of the union-wide bargaining committee mid negotiations on a first contract and about a one day strike last Christmas Eve meant to spur further progress in the negotiation process.
Since the Birmingham store unionized with the SBWU in 2022, workers there have repeatedly criticized management’s treatment of the union, including by filing unfair labor practice charges with the National Labor Relations Board.
In 2023, after over a year of processing, filings and testimony, an administrative law judge with the NLRB ruled that one SBWU member at the Birmingham store was illegally fired just months after the successful unionization vote “because they engaged in union and protected concerted activities.”
Now, workers there are saying district manager, Isaac Crawford, has repeatedly singled out union members and engaged in “definite retaliation” for their ongoing canvassing in collaboration with the Birmingham Democratic Socialists of America. During canvasses, SBWU and DSA members go to non-unionized Starbucks stores and ask workers about their schedules and overstaffing.
A representative of Birmingham DSA’s labor working group told APR the organization has been supporting SBWU since before the Birmingham store officially unionized because they “understand the power workers have.”
He also reported that members of Birmingham DSA have personally witnessed and heard firsthand accounts of anti-union behavior by Starbucks management.
“We have had managers tell us we are breaking the law when unionized workers have the right to go out and speak with other coworkers,” he complained. “We’ve actively heard firsthand accounts of management not wanting to hear or see anything closely resembling the union. They toss away our flyers and usually like to speak badly about the unionized workers at the 20th store.”
Naomi said that while she was out canvassing recently, Crawford came into the store and “jumped up and went to the workers, and took away the flyers that I had given them after I had this conversation with them that was positive and fun.”
The day after Naomi ran into Crawford while canvassing, she says, he told everyone at the Birmingham store that they could not wear pins or buttons on the floor.
“I told him I’m allowed to wear like my union pin,” she stated. “It’s federally protected law, and, you know, it’s in the dress code. It’s in the old dress code and it’s in the new dress code.” APR found that online versions of the 2023 dress code and 2025 dress code explicitly permit employees to wear one pin “supporting a labor organization,” in the language of the most recent revision. A representative of Starbucks did not speak to the specific events at the Birmingham store but confirmed that “our dress code policy does allow for a union pin.”
After that, “[Crawford] walked into the middle of the cafe and told partners in front of customers that I don’t take my job seriously,” Naomi recounted. “And that was very, very insulting.”
Ja’Lena, the other barista APR spoke to, said that at one point Crawford “directly came to me and he looked at [my button], and he pointed, he touched it. He said, ‘Oh, so that’s what you’re choosing, that’s what you stand for.’”
“I said ‘I believe in what’s right,’ and I left it at that. I walked away,” she said.
“The right to wear union insignia in the workplace was first blessed by the Supreme Court in a 1945 case called Republic Aviation,” labor lawyer Matt Bruenig explained. “The Supreme Court held that this right was established by the National Labor Relations Act.” Bruenig maintains the website NLRB Edge where he posts summaries of and commentary on recent NLRB news as well as NLRB Research, a public, searchable database of NLRB decisions.
He told APR “the issue of dress code enforcement has come up a lot” during the Starbucks campaign, pointing to a search in his database returning over fifty NLRB decisions since 2021 that have touched on or revolved around the topic.
In one screenshot of a group chat shared with APR, a worker vehemently complained about Crawford citing all of the transgender women working one day for dress code violations. A recent change to the chain’s dress code requiring solid black shirts and specific types of pants has also drawn criticism from many employees of the company, including Naomi who said it clashes with the company being “really known for our uniqueness in the coffee industry.”
Ja’Lena also described a recent incident where she says Crawford prevented her from returning to work with a medical scooter due to her support for the union and alleged he has taken insufficient care for workers’ safety in recent months. She told APR she’d received permission from her store manager to work, only for him to be overruled while she was mid-shift.
“[The store manager] calls me, and he says, and I quote, ‘Hey, go somewhere where I can talk to you, where you’re by yourself.’ So I already know it’s going to be some B.S.,” she said. “And I’m like, ‘Okay.’ So he said, ‘Isaac said that you’re a liability, and you cannot work with the scooter, and I’m going to have to come back to the store when we’re done with the meeting and send you home.’”
“I can’t work and I can’t get my disability, and then they put in another claim with my paperwork from the doctors and sent it to Jason and Isaac, saying that I would be allowed to return to work,” Ja’Lena elaborated. “I would have been allowed to return to work yesterday. They overturned it and I got a text message from [the store manager] saying I cannot come back to work until my cast is off.”
A few days ago, she launched a GoFundMe trying to raise money for medical expenses and May’s rent. Over $600 has been donated to the fundraiser since it was shared on the Birmingham SBWU and Birmingham DSA’s social media accounts.
Text messages shared with APR also showed communications between one worker and a store manager about dangerous conditions during the 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. shift, including discussions of closing the cafe early and working with the landlord to acquire around the clock security. Naomi and Ja’Lena claimed Crawford rolled back some of these measures, including by “not [paying] the bill” for a police presence.
Naomi, like she has in her previous interviews with APR, stressed that “a message from our union is to make sure that Starbucks is the workplace that they want it to be, so that it has the reputation that they want it to have, they have to come bargain with us in good faith and help us solidify a contract that that workers feel good about, as well as Starbucks.”
“Workers have been engaging in good faith with Starbucks corporate but corporate does not want to reciprocate that respect,” the member of Birmingham DSA’s labor working group stated. “They have been actively trying to overshadow the union by giving bargaining asks to all workers instead of bargaining with unionized workers.”
“Our big ask is we want to stop this, and a contract is how we stop this,” Naomi declared. “And then secondly, we’re going to be canvassing 10 times harder. We’re going to be growing our store 10 times stronger.” She also asked that people consider donating to Ja’Lena’s GoFundMe and said the union would continue posting about the situation on their social media accounts.
Crawford did not respond to attempts to directly contact him.
