Orlando Airport Starbucks Employees Call on the Coffee Giant to Respond to Allegations of LGBTQ Discrimination
In a push to get Starbucks to respond to alleged cases of discrimination at its airport coffee shops, Orlando equality advocates delivered a letter to a local Starbucks Wednesday afternoon, hoping the letter will reach the attention of the company’s corporate leaders as a national campaign on worker rights wages on.
It was signed by 44 local, regional and national organizations advocating for LGBTQ people, immigrants and people of color, including the National LGBTQ Task Force, and One Orlando Alliance, which was born after the Pulse nightclub shooting.
The issue centers on stores operated by HMSHost, a restaurateur that runs about 20 restaurants at Orlando International Airport and operates many Starbucks at airports across the country. Earlier this month, hospitality worker union Unite Here released a report detailing instances of misgendering, discrimination and, in one case, sexual harassment taking place at restaurants and stores run by HMSHost.
Many of those issues affected workers in Orlando, one of whom says he was asked by managers to “tone down” his makeup and was later fired — without just cause, he claims. Another transgender Starbucks employee said managers laughed at him when he repeatedly asked them to call him by his chosen name, Jay, instead of his birth name, Jessica.
The report analyzed pay across HMSHost-operated Starbucks in 27 airports and found the median wage for white baristas was $13 an hour, while black baristas made median pay of $11.15 an hour. The disparity is at odds with an announcement from Starbucks in November 2019 that said people of color were paid 100% equally as their white counterparts. Starbucks also closed all its stores for racial bias training in 2018, but HMSHost stores remained open, the report found.
“We call on Starbucks to use whatever power it has to ensure these issues are resolved at HMSHost-operated Starbucks stores across the United States,” the letter said. The coffee giant did not respond to a request for comment, deferring comment to HMSHost.
HMSHost told the Orlando Sentinel that it considers its commitment to diversity “one of the sources of our strength.” The company has launched a website to address the concerns, noting it believes the report is not representative of all employees and saying the campaign is a result of an effort to unionize locations across airports. This week, Orlando Starbucks airport employees filed their intent to organize with the National Labor Relations Board.
The company said it is investigating accusations made by its workers.
One of those employees, Orlando barista Jay Kelly, stood outside a Starbucks on Summerlin Avenue in Thornton Park Wednesday afternoon as representatives prepared to deliver the letter to the store’s manager. Kelly, who is still employed at an Orlando airport Starbucks, said managers refuse to use his chosen name on the work schedule and often ridicule him by calling him “miss” or “her.”
“I’m not human in their eyes,” Kelly said. “I’m here to prove my point that I’m going to sit here and keep going until my name is on that [schedule].”
Christopher Cuevas, executive director of QLatinX, and Jennifer Foster, One Orlando Alliance’s executive director, delivered the letter. The Starbucks was chosen because it’s not run by HMSHost — the idea was to get the message directly to the corporation by creating a paper trail.
“I’d like to thank you for being such an inclusive store for our community,” Foster told the store’s manager, who took the letter. Another letter has also been sent to Starbucks executives in Seattle.
“Their brand is being tainted by outright discrimination and it’s happening here in Orlando,” Foster said later. “A company is only as good as their brand, their reputation and for a company like Starbucks to openly support the transgender community and the same time allow for discrimination to be happening is kind of like talking out both sides of the mouth. Where do they stand?”
Contact the reporter at [email protected] or 407-420-5660; Twitter @ChabeliH
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