No beans, no bearistas, no gift cards

Dear Pamela, This season, we're not buying Starbucks while baristas are on strike. That means more than just skipping lattes: not buying Starbucks means no beans, no bearista cups, and…NO GIFT CARDS. This year, it's time to give something else: working class solidarity. In solidarity with Starbucks baristas, The Labor Force has launched SolidarityWithBaristas.org. There, you can pledge to spend however much you'd normally spend on Starbucks gift cards elsewhere, and find locally sourced gift alternatives. Add your pledge to our Collective Impact Counter so we can show Starbucks just how much it's losing by failing to negotiate a fair contract with its workers! The act of skipping Starbucks gift cards this year is more impactful than you may realize, because for Starbucks, the gift cards are a literal profit-machine. Or, as one journalist put it, "Starbucks doesn't just profit off selling you coffee, it also profits from selling you the idea of coffee." According to Business Insider, Starbucks gift cards are bigger than the entire gift card industry. At any given time, Starbucks has over 1 billion dollars sitting unspent on gift cards. Specifically, the company's Q4 2024 report calculated that Starbucks had 1.78 billion dollars in stored gift card funds at the end of the fiscal year. That's enough to buy everyone in the U.S. a fancy latte–and Starbucks is holding this money interest-free. Additionally, about 10% of gift card dollars are never spent, but still count as revenue for the company. Standing in solidarity with striking Starbucks baristas is simple: Don't cross the picket line. Don't buy Starbucks coffee. And don't buy Starbucks gift cards–but do add your pledge to our collective impact counter and send a powerful message to Starbucks: come to the table and negotiate a fair contract with your workers! Solidarity forever, The Labor Force Paid for by Progress America, a project of Strategy & Hustle   Sent via ActionNetwork.org. To update your email address, change your name or address, or to stop receiving emails from Progress America, please click here.