Starbucks employees at the 1448 Naperville Wheaton Road store in Naperville have voted 12-5 to join Starbucks Workers United, the union that represents more than 11,000 baristas at over 560 stores across the country.

They represent the first Starbucks in Naperville — and the 41st in Illinois — to unionize.

The vote comes as Starbucks union baristas across the country continue to strike against the company, with 36 Starbucks locations in 34 cities joining the nationwide movement Thursday. Naperville was not among the list of stores that joined the strike.

“Inspired by their co-workers taking action to demand a fair contract and an end to unfair labor practices, the Naper and Ogden partners join a growing nationwide movement of Starbucks baristas working together to win a real voice on the job and the support and protections they need to succeed,” Starbucks Workers United said in a news release on the vote.

In a separate news release issued Thursday, Starbucks Workers United said more than 3,800 union baristas across more than 180 stores in over 130 cities have joined the picket line as workers protest unfair labor practices, marking the longest unfair labor practices strike in the company’s history.

In Illinois, unionized Starbucks locations in eight cities have joined the strike, including  Aurora, Geneva, Chicago and Evanston, according to a memo from the union.

On Wednesday, Starbucks Workers United announced the start of a two-day strike at locations across the Loop and River North neighborhoods in Chicago, with the intention of keeping pickets running day and night until Friday morning.

Starbucks Workers United would not say if workers at the newly unionized Naperville location plan to strike, but said “workers expect to grow their efforts if Starbucks stays dug-in.”

Starbucks spokeswoman Jaci Anderson said the company respects the Naperville store’s choice to be represented by a union and “will continue to work together to make Starbucks the best job in retail.”

There have been occasional union strikes against the company since 2022, but the current one is part of a larger effort to push Starbucks to negotiate the first labor contract between the union and the company.

In December 2023, Starbucks vowed to finalize an agreement with the union by the end of 2024. But in August 2024, the company ousted Laxman Narasimhan, the CEO who made that promise. The union said progress has stalled under Brian Niccol, the company’s current chairman and CEO. The two sides haven’t been at the bargaining table since April.

On Nov. 13, more than 1,000 unionized Starbucks employees at 65 U.S. stores went on strike. While there were strikes that took place before, including in Aurora, the Nov. 13 protest marked the beginning of the current open-ended strike. The nationwide protest was intended to disrupt Starbucks’ annual Red Cup Day, where the company gives out a free, reusable cup to customers who buy a holiday drink — one of the busiest days of the year for the company.

Starbucks maintains that the ongoing strike activity has not had any major disruption on their operations.

“Fewer than 1% of our 17,000 U.S. coffeehouses were ever affected,” Anderson said.

The union claims Starbucks continues to refuse to come to the bargaining table to address their core demands, including higher take-home pay, better hours to improve store staffing and a resolution to address outstanding unfair labor practices filed for union busting.

Workers say that long wait times continue to be a problem at stores due in part to understaffing. According to the memo from Starbucks Workers United, the average barista usually gets assigned to less than 20 hours of work a week, leaving them unable to qualify for benefits.

Union reps also say the contract they are seeking would cost less than $80 million to finalize, which they say is less than what company executives are making and less than the $81 million the company spent in June on a conference in Las Vegas for 14,000 store managers and regional leaders.

Union employees also want the company to resolve hundreds of unfair labor practice charges filed by workers, claiming Starbucks has fired baristas in retaliation for unionizing and has failed to bargain over changes in policy that workers must enforce, like its decision earlier this year to limit restroom use to paying customers.

Last month, Starbucks’ Chief Partner Officer Sara Kelly said the union walked away from negotiations and that the company would like to return to the bargaining table. Kelly also said in her letter that the company offers significant wages and benefits, including 18 weeks’ paid family leave and 100% tuition coverage for a four-year college beginning at an average of 20 hours per week.

“We know pay and benefits are important. That’s why Starbucks offers the best overall wage and benefits package in retail, worth on average $30 per hour for hourly partners,” Kelly said.

Some of the union’s proposals would significantly alter Starbucks’ operations, such as giving workers the ability to shut down mobile ordering if a store has more than five orders in the queue, she said.

A spokesperson for Starbucks also said more than 166,000 U.S. partners – about 85% of the company’s partners – are receiving their preferred staffing hours. Starbucks also claims their current employee turnover is half the industry standard, a record low for the company.

“The facts show people like working at Starbucks,” Kelly said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

cstein@chicagotribune.com

https://www.chicagotribune.com/2025/12/11/naperville-starbucks-unionized-ongoing-strikes/