Because an employee at a Starbucks store in New York was fired, the entire workforce has left the store. The video that was filmed goes around the world.
New York – An incident at a Starbucks in New York is currently causing a stir on social media platforms worldwide. An employee who had worked at Starbucks for 13 years was fired. This led to a strike by the other employees, who left the Starbucks branch at the same time. The video recorded at the time has already had almost 24 million views on the TikTok platform.
33-year-old Sam Amato had spent most of his working life at Starbucks before being fired for a violation. According to reports, the violation has something to do with an early store closure, which was said to have happened weeks ago.
Starbucks in the US: Workers join union
As the US magazine Fortune reports, Amato is involved in the union for the rights of employees. The assumption is that his dismissal is related to his union membership. However, the American coffeehouse chain, which is known for catering to its customers’ special requests, denies that this was the reason for the dismissal, according to the Fortune article.
In the US, more and more Starbucks stores are joining the union to take action against systematically unfair working conditions within the company as well as chronic understaffing and a lack of occupational safety. Starbucks spokesman Reggie Borges emailed the New York Times to say the company has nothing against workers organizing.
After termination at Starbucks: All employees leave the store in New York
The strength of the employee movement is illustrated by the incident at the Starbucks store in the city of Buffalo, New York. When Amato left the store on the day he was fired, he didn’t go alone. All the employees who worked in the store went out with him to show their support. Several union members from Starbucks Workers United and workers from other locations joined. The action was filmed and the video was finally published on the TikTok platform.
The television station RTL also took up the topic in its reporting. In Germany, the story about the striking Starbucks employees is also well received. Comments such as “Class and respect” or “Such cohesion is great” accumulate under the RTL Facebook post. However, a reference to Germany is also made in the comments: “Wouldn’t be possible in Germany, everyone here thinks of themselves,” wrote one user. Another commented: “It will never happen in Germany, everyone is their own neighbor. There is no more cohesion here!” (hg)
