“Race Together” to TPP at Starbucks
by Gaius Publius
Much is being made of the attempt by Starbucks billionaire owner Howard Schultz to wash himself and his company in Millennial-friendly, racial justice cred by asking his “partners” (employees, retail counter workers) to write “Race Together” on coffee cups. Wonderful social-justice move, or cynical self-branding ploy? Race Together to justice, or simply to profit?
My guess in both cases is the latter, but feel free to decide for yourself. Starbucks is, after all, a corporation. While Starbucks may be just the local morning brew shop to most people, it’s also the largest company of its type in the world, a real money machine:
Starbucks is the largest coffeehouse company in the world ahead of UK rival Costa Coffee, with 21,536 stores in 64 countries and territories, including 12,218 in the United States, 1,716 in China, 1,330 in Canada, 1,079 in Japan and 808 in the United Kingdom.
Revenue topped $14 billion in 2013, and for the quarter ending December 28, 2014, the company showed a 13% increase over the year before. And of that money, Schultz and his fellows drink deep. Which means that Starbucks, like every other CEO-dominated corporation, has an insatiable need for profit, and therefore a seat at the secret, profit-protecting TPP negotiating table.
From the good people at Sardonicky:
Race for the Bucks
For sheer tone-deaf chutzpah, Starbucks and its billionaire CEO Howard Schultz deserve every single one of the vitriolic Tweets being hurled their way over their latest phony marketing campaign. The ploy is to get the rich white people who buy their overpriced coffee — and the poor white people who serve them their overpriced coffee — to forget all about wealth inequality and the class war, and have an awkward concern-trolling conversation about black people instead.
As if you needed another reason to boycott Starbucks.
But, if you still insist on patronizing this franchise for your $5 fix of caffeine, I suggest you also instigate a conversation about the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Starbucks is, after all, one of the 600 or so lucky multinational corporations negotiating in secret to take over the world. …
There’s more, including some suggested ways for you to “initiate a conversation” with your Starbucks “partner” (do it gently though; these are the Starbucks equivalent of McDonalds employees, victims like the rest of us).
In Starbucks case, the TPP provisions of interest revolve around agriculture, including possible restrictions to something called “fair trade” (which Starbucks dislikes) and global deregulation of GMOs (which Starbucks incorporates into many of its foods).
About Starbucks and “fair trade”:
Starbucks fails the Fair Trade test
Starbucks wants you to feel all warm and fuzzy about buying its coffee. But here are the facts. According to the company’s own global impact report, only 8.4 percent of the company’s coffee purchases in 2013 were certified fair trade.
So how does the company get around such a dismal fair trade track record, and still fool consumers into thinking it “cares” about coffee farmers? By creating its very own “fair” trade standards.
Again, according to the coffee giant’s global impact report, 95.3 percent of Starbucks coffee is “ethically sourced.” But all that means is that those coffee purchases meet the (weak) standards of Starbucks’ in-house program, called CAFE (Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices). These sub-standard standards are often applied to large-scale plantations, which then compete against small-scale coffee co-ops for which (real) fair trade standards were intended to provide market opportunities.
Starbucks’ CAFÉ standards are focused on the farm level, not on Starbucks’ own commitment to farmers in terms or long-term stability. Unlike genuine fair trade standards, the CAFÉ program standards don’t specify either a minimum price or a standard for negotiating price that would guarantee a fair price for small farmers.
You can learn more about how Starbucks skirts the Fair Trade issue at the Fair World Project.
About Starbucks and TPP (same link):
A representative from Starbucks has a seat at the table of the highly secretive negotiations for the Trans Pacific Partnership, a global trade deal being negotiated behind closed doors. The public and most of Congress have been shut out of the negotiations—but nearly 600 corporations, including Starbucks, have full access.
When a representative from the OCA’s Fair World Project contacted Starbucks to ask what role the company is playing on the negotiating team, and what policies the company is advocating, she was referred to the company website for its “policies on free trade.”
Just what you’d expect from a billionaire likely-libertarian like the union-hating Schultz:
You don’t have to look far to find high-profile CEO types who are likely
Libertarians hiding out in the major parties. Starbucks’s Howard
Schultz has broken with Democratic tradition (and his political donation
record) and fought unionization.
Profit first — that’s one way Starbucks’ CEO “races forward,” and he’d be the first to be proud of it (though likely only to his peers). Here is another race-forward action by the Millennial-friendly Schultz, his menu:
And at least on the West Coast, every single pastry item arrives at the store individually wrapped and sealed in plastic. Individually. Every single item. That’s a ton of single-use plastic that dies before 10 in the morning. Do they recycle? Not at my store.
If you don’t believe me, ask to look at it. It’s quite a sight. (And remember, the employee didn’t make that decision; Schultz and the other high-wage executives did.)
My suggestion: If your barista hands you a cup with “Race Forward” written on it — add “By Fighting Fast Track & TPP” and hand it back. Then ask for an unadorned cup and tell her she can keep that one for herself, as food for thought. You too can be Millennial-friendly and build a better world at Starbucks.
GP
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