Starbucks again . . . .

Letter I have written, but not yet sent, to the DM and RD of my Starbucks District. I am currently a VERY disgruntled worker, but still very grateful to have any job at all.

Read on, if you dare:

"This is an open letter to not just Howard Schultz of Starbucks, but more importantly and immediately to the top-feeders in my district and my region of Starbuck's operations (that is, Southern California). I have been working for Starbucks for about eight or nine months and have found the company stores to be, all in all, a very pleasant place to work. I am thankful for and applaud the good benefits, the S.I.P. stocks, and all the other Partner Perks, and yet, as of late, I have noticed some trends within the company that concern me.

I understand that the company is operating in a very difficult marketplace, as are we all in this deep recession. However, I must say that while I applaud the idea of having an "in-house" health inspection team, I also am concerned that the standards by this team have been set to an almost unimaginable height. There is a feeling among most baristas and shift-supervisors I've known that there is an increasing disconnect between store workers and those in the corporate offices of Starbucks. It is almost as if there is an inability for those that have never worked in a Starbucks store, or those that haven't done so in a very long time, to be able to relate to the demands placed on one every half-a-minute during your average shift in a Starbucks store. Employees must burn a lot of calories while on the floor - we never stop moving and we move fast to meet all of the needs that are constantly presented to us. Most of us, I can assure you, are working extremely hard, and yet in spite of all of this, not to mention the fact that none of us wants to fail a QASA audit (we can NOT afford to in this economy and job market) I still find employees getting written up, and stores missing "opportunities" and failing audits in my district on a fairly regular basis.

Despite all of this, what I see as an employee is not just a persistence in highly difficult (sometimes seemingly impossible) QASA audits, but, amazingly, more and more new tasks being delegated out to already overworked Baristas, shifts, and managers. To make it clear: Opening, pre-closing, and especially closing shifts are very difficult to complete by the time workers are supposed to exit the store. After a lot of work and elbow grease, a new employee may very well get to the point where they can make it out on time most of the time, but this doesn't always happen, and the resulting overtime costs to the company must be staggering. These new tasks, in my district, include washing all the sinks every night, bunching together all outdoor furniture and locking it up, and much, much more. It is increasingly common for me to see coworkers, sometimes including myself, working at least an hour overtime to get all of this done, even on nights when business is slow. All of this makes me question who is at the wheel in all of this?

Imagine working in a chaotic, fast-paced environment where timers are going off at least every ten minutes, a line of customers out the door are demanding fast service (drinks within 3 minutes), labor cuts have forced only two people on the floor at any given time, customer demands have necessitated that no lobby runs have been done in at least half-an-hour, and in walks a QASA audit! The store is theoretically bound to fail this audit. None of this seems like a fair scenario for employees and managers to be put in. The standards are too high, and that is me being GENTLE. If I weren't, I'd say they are absolutely ridiculous.

To be clear: we work very hard, and yet, when a DM or QASA walks into the store, everyone panics. The tension in the place rises to an incomprehensible degree, and people immediately scatter to make sure the store is as clean as possible. This often results in a temporary decline in Starbuck's "legendary" customer service as managers often instruct employees to put customer service on hold temporarily while Qasa is in the building. This is reprehensible behavior brought on by unreachable standards, and there is no reason for employees to be dealing with stress, fear and panic of this kind.

We already deal with working conditions we would be perfectly justified in complaining about, even unionizing over. One small, but actually fairly detrimental, example is the sanitizer we are forced to work with, no questions asked. This stuff works wonders on our dishes, counters, etc. It keeps things very QASA friendly, but it . . . well burns our hands, along with a great many other chemicals we work with, including the Turbochef Oven Cleaners, the UrnEx cleaners, and more. After a few closing shifts in a row, I find my hands feel like the Sahara desert. I am far from the only one who's complained. A coworker showed me permanent scars she has on her hands from chemical burns, the result of working at Starbucks for over two years. The dryness my hands experience all day, every day, since working at Starbucks is very, very difficult to cure. My hands have cracked and bled, and I myself have a couple of scars from burns. I often wear yellow rubber gloves filled with moisturizer to bed. Not too comfortable, if you can imagine. This is no way for employees to be treated.

In an economy that has had a history of the need for worker Unions, please to not force the burden of a difficult economy onto more of your workers. We work VERY hard, but we cannot do the impossible.

Naturally, this letter, when sent, is completely anonymous. I fear losing a difficult-to-get and very in-demand job in a jobless economy when I have a daughter to feed, but I couldn't help but send it after witnessing the difficult-to-impossible conditions this district currently has its 'Partners' working in."