COLA Pressures Cornell to Change Coffee Provider
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As Cornell decides whether or not to renew its contract with Starbucks, the Cornell Organization for Labor Action is putting student pressure on the administration to find an alternative coffee supplier, due to the accusations of Starbucks’s questionable labor practices.
In many cafés on campus, Cornell students drink Seattle’s Best Coffee, which is owned by Starbucks. While this may seem like a harmless activity, to some students, Cornell may actually be endorsing unfair labor practices.
Fil Eden ’10, member of COLA, believes there are dangerous unintended consequences of supporting Starbucks.
“The National Labor Relations Board is a government agency that investigates potential labor violations only if the accuser has a good case,” Eden said. “The NLRB has accused Starbucks of 38 labor violations. Some of the violation accusations include forbidding workers to talk about unionizing on the job or firing workers trying to start a union. Cornell should not renew the contract with Starbucks if they are being accused of potential labor violations.”
Tara Darrow, a Starbucks spokeswoman, makes the distinction between accused and potential labor violations.
“The National Labor Relations Board has not made any decisions related to the hearing at this time, and Starbucks has not been found to have committed any unfair labor practices by the NLRB or any other court,” Darrow said. “That is an important item for clarification.”
Although Cornell is aware of these possible violations of labor standards, the University is still hesitant to make any presumptions about the entire company.
Victor Younger, general manager of Retail Operations of Cornell Dining, said, “In any large organization there is going to be problems of this nature. However, this might not be representative of Starbucks.”
Enraged by Starbucks labor practices, COLA has made efforts to kick Seattle’s Best Coffee off Cornell’s campus by providing Cornell Dining with alternate coffee supplier who have high quality of labor practices. On Oct. 30 and 31, Cornell Dining let the students select the on-campus coffee provider by hosting Coffee Taste Tests, which compared Seattle’s Best Coffee with other coffee suppliers, Omar’s Coffee, McCullagh’s Coffee, Ola’s Coffee, Ithaca Coffee and Gimme! Coffee.
By discussing their views with the University and implementing their ideas in surveys aimed to gather student feedback, COLA has played an active role through Cornell Dining’s decision process.
“We have been working with COLA through the process by keeping them abreast about recent developments and incorporating their thoughts in our student survey,” Younger said. “There are seven main criteria that make up our decision. These include fair trade, ability to make a Cornell blend, marketing strategy, event support, equipment, utilizing a local company as a distributor, and price points. We are looking these components when making our final choice.”
Although this has been a heated topic for some students, Fil Eden is surprised that this issue with Starbucks has not been a source of major protest on Cornell’s campus. Even though it does not pertain to the welfare of Cornell students, Eden urges kids to become better educated consumers.
“We’re living in an age in which a lot of people do not think when they buy things,” Eden said. “It’s hard to believe but every person’s shopping habits, like Starbucks coffee, may have drastic consequences somewhere else. It is hard to tell people to care about people they will never meet or even know.”
According to Prof. Sarosh Kuruvilla, collective bargaining, consumer pressure is an important motivator for companies to uphold ethical labor standards.
“What motivates companies’ ethical practices are external pressures and being seen as a good corporate citizen,” Kuruvilla said. “The two are closely related. If a company can make the case it’s ethical, then this becomes a good defense against any future problems. When an error arises, a corporation with fair labor standards can fall back on the fact that their company is socially responsible. Consumers are a major part of the external pressure because they are what determine a firm’s bottom line.”
Not only do consumers have substantial power to ensure corporate social responsibility, but college kids also have a unique ability to organize such campaigns to promote fair labor practices.
“College students are one kind of consumer,” Kuruvilla said. “They have the time, idealism and energy needed to organize these campaigns. As long as college students can vocalize their complaints and put pressure on large corporations to have fair labor practices, then they can progress the ethics of global labor standards.”
As for Cornell’s final decision, Younger believes that Cornell will choose a coffee supplier within the upcoming weeks.
“We’ve gathered back all the information and are now analyzing it,” Younger said. “We will be making our decision after Thanksgiving.”
Top 10 Reasons NOT To Drink Coffee
Top 10 Reasons NOT To Drink Coffee
1- Coffee is a stimulator of the central nervous system that provides the adrenal with a shot and adrenal is a stress-handling hormone. Coffee also stimulates the production of cortisol, which results in heightened awareness and alertness.
2- Though coffee is not linked to cancer but it contains carcinogens and other chemicals that trigger cancer cells.
3- Due to the increase of cortisol effect, the blood vessel constricts and the heart pumps faster and thus increases the blood pressure.
4-Caffeine is very harmful for pregnant women as the liver in fetuses cannot metabolize the caffeine and so it remains in the body arousing the brain resulting in sleeplessness and irritability.
5-According to research coffee is been associated with birth defects, miscarriages, inability to conceive and sluggish sperm.
6-Many of the chemicals present in coffee can irritate the sensitive stomach lining by increasing the stomach acidity thus leading to digestive disorders.
7- Coffee reduces the quality of sleep.
8-Coffee also causes dehydration.
9-Coffee stains your teeth and causes cavities in the teeth.
10-Coffee generally stimulates the frequency of urination and thus you lose various vitamins and minerals. Caffeine reduces the calcium content in the body.
Get the real scoop on coffee at www.CaffeineAwareness.org
Test your caffeine smarts with the caffeine quiz.
And if you drink decaf you wont want to miss this special free report on the Dangers of Decaf available at www.soyfee.com
Health scare nonsense; famous local roaster
This article seems like a poor place to hook a "comment" like the preceding health scare nonsense. Responsible studies have found moderate coffee consumption to be beneficial at best and benign at worst. A typical article is here at WebMD, "Coffee: The New Health Food? Plenty of health benefits are brewing in America's beloved beverage." http://men.webmd.com/features/coffee-new-health-food.
I hope Cornell Dining is aware that Gimme Coffee is reknowned by coffee lovers around the country and has been recommended by Food and Wine Magazine, The New York Times and others. It is a local treasure that really deserves support by Cornell.
Go Local!
Everyone here in the Northwest knows that if you want good coffee you go with Portland Roasting, or Stumptown, or ... but seriously folks, go local! (Central NY needs all the help it can get.)
Starbucks--anti-worker, anti-community.
Shame on Cornell Dining for obfuscating what is cut-and-dried evidence of anti-worker policy at Starbucks. Thank you students for lifting your voices for justice and community over profit and corporate hegemony.
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/06/19/starbucks-accused-of-firing...
The Starbucks Corporation has gotten in trouble again with the National Labor Relations Board over how it treats pro-union employees. The union contends that a worker was fired for attending a book-release event by Howard Schultz, the founder of Starbucks, at a Starbucks at 29th Street and Park Avenue, where protesters chanted, “Shame, shame.”
As our predecessor blog, The Empire Zone, reported in April, Starbucks has been accused of retaliating against workers supportive of unionization at four coffee shops in Manhattan.
At the time, the board asserted that Starbucks supervisors:
prohibited employees from discussing the union while off duty;
interrogated employees about their support for the union;
threatened to fire employees for supporting the union;
disciplined workers or sent them home for supporting the union;
arbitrarily implemented a new rule prohibiting employees from wearing more then one pro-union button at any time;
selectively enforced a dress code that, among other things, prohibited employees from wearing more than two earrings per ear.
On June 12, the labor relations board added a new charge against the coffee-store chain.
The new charge involves a pro-union barista, Isis Saenz, who was fired last November from her job at a Starbucks shop at 145 Second Avenue, in the East Village. The labor board complaint states only that Ms. Saenz was fired for supporting the union, but the union says that Ms. Saenz was fired after taking part in the protest at a store near Gramercy Park, where Mr. Schultz, the company’s chairman, was to attend a book-release event.