The Canadian Starbucks Unionization Wave Has Scored Another Victory
Canada’s Starbucks organizing wave is moving eastward from British Columbia, with a store in Alberta going union earlier this month. Poetically, the Starbucks union win is on anti-labor Alberta premier Jason Kenney’s home turf.
The first Starbucks store in Alberta, Canada, has gone union, with more likely to follow. (Artur Widak/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
The Canadian wave of Starbucks unionization has moved eastward, with a majority of workers at a Calgary location voting in favor of organizing under the banner of United Steelworkers (USW). The election marks the establishment of the first Starbucks union shop in Alberta, as announced by the union on July 12.
The vote arrives on the heels of two stores in two cities — Surrey and Langley — in Alberta’s neighboring British Columbia voting to join USW over the past two months. A further five stores in Lethbridge, Alberta, await word on certification. Prior to June 2022, the only unionized Starbucks in Canada was in Victoria, British Columbia.
The Millrise Centre store is located in the Calgary-Lougheed district and represented in the Alberta legislature by lame duck Alberta premier Jason Kenney. It’s an understatement to say Kenney has been no friend of the labor movement. Kenney spent his three years in provincial government tearing down most of the labor-friendly reforms implemented by his liberal predecessors in the New Democratic Party (NDP).
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