Rebel barista with a cause challenges employee policies at Starbucks

[dArKeR]

NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE , New York

In the cozy corporate lingo of Starbucks, the java-servers in company baseball caps and green aprons are so far evolved from folks who, in quainter, less caffeinated and less linguistically sensitive times, were dubbed soda jerks, that the coffee chain graces them with a special name: baristas. The moniker conveys a Euro-cachet, implies a certain skill set and is the entry-level niche at a US$15 billion behemoth with a hot -- in more ways than one -- product and a rung on the Fortune 100 best-places-to-work list.

Baristas like Daniel Gross who pour enough coffee fast enough, and with affable competence, can command US$8.09 per hour after a year on the job, up from a starting wage of US$7.75. Scalding stuff, according to Gross, with or without meager tips. And without a defined workload: No barista is guaranteed a 40-hour week.

Good luck trying to save enough to buy company-sponsored health care or incubate a nest egg, he says. Not with rents on bare-bones railroad flats like his in Bushwick, Brooklyn, pushing US$1,000 a month.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/archives/2004/06/13/2003174912


Danial Gross
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/biz/photo/2004/06/13/2003138007

[Raskolnik]

1. They still just make coffee, right?

Since when is being a barista considered a career?

[TexasMexican]

3. Its not when its becomes...

fast fooderized.

[TexasMexican]

2. Rebel Bautistas

for a moment thats what I thought it read.

[candy331]

4. Yep just like corporate America

give you a big title to swell your head but no money or benefits amounting to a swift kick in the ass. Nothing original since they stole the title from the real baristas Italians and Swiss who know how to pull a real espresso shot rather than high cost mud..

[LittleApple81]

5. 17 M for executives, boiling coffee and milk for baristas. n/t