‘Angry Starbucks Employees’... Unprecedented ‘Truck Protest’

On the 7th, in front of the Starbucks Sangam YTN branch in Mapo-gu, Seoul, the 'Starbucks Korea Truck Protest Squad,' composed of Starbucks store employees, held a truck protest with a truck they prepared, urging for improved working conditions and a ban on excessive marketing. Photo by Jinhyung Kang aymsdream@

[Asia Economy Reporter Moon Hyewon] Starbucks Coffee Korea store employees (partners) began an unprecedented two-day "truck protest" starting on the 7th. This is the first time in Starbucks' 22 years of operation in Korea. They are demanding improvements in working conditions and a ban on excessive marketing from the headquarters.

On this day, the "Starbucks Korea Truck Protest Representatives (hereafter Representatives)," composed of Starbucks store employees, announced through the community platform "Blind" that "the purpose of the truck protest is to have Starbucks Korea acknowledge that operating the company with insufficient on-site staff over the past few years has directly caused partners to be treated like disposable items, and furthermore, to demand that specific measures to resolve the staffing shortage be proposed and implemented."

The Representatives plan to conduct the protest by touring major stores in the Gangnam and Gangbuk areas with two trucks. The trucks will display banners containing the demands of store employees, such as improving working conditions and refraining from excessive goods marketing. The banners will include messages reflecting the hardships of store employees, such as "Employee break rooms smaller than 5 pyeong (approx. 16.5 square meters), Starbucks partners eat their meals next to mops every day," and "We want to sell daily coffee rather than marketing events that run all year round."

The background of this incident stems from the Starbucks reusable cup event held on the 28th of last month. Starbucks partner A revealed on Blind that the influx of visitors was so intense that employees could not take breaks and had to work under extreme pressure. A stated, "At one store, the number of waiting drinks reached 650," and added, "Seeing the flood of customers and the record-high number of waiting drinks, I wanted to run away crying, but I gritted my teeth and endured it out of a sense of responsibility."

On the 5th, Starbucks held a "Happiness Council" meeting where store employees and headquarters executives discussed improvement measures. CEO Song Hoseop sent an apology email to store employees that same evening.

In the email, CEO Song said, "During the long Chuseok holiday and the autumn promotion season, an unexpectedly large number of customers visited stores. I apologize for the excessive workload and great burden placed on partners due to the unforeseen lack of preparation during the reusable cup event on the 28th of last month," and added, "We will take this opportunity to reflect on any overlooked areas, listen carefully to partners' opinions, and review processes to incorporate their feedback."

The headquarters plans to release an official stance on the main improvement demands of store employees by the third week of this month. Starbucks operates all its stores nationwide as directly managed locations. Starting with 40 partners at the first store opening in January 1999, it now directly employs approximately 18,000 partners.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.