By Amelia Lucas
Source: CNBC
Workers at the Starbucks and Amazon Go store in midtown Manhattan filed a petition for a union election on Friday.
It’s the first Starbucks cafe that uses Amazon’s cashierless technology to try to unionize under Workers United and just the second of its kind. The store, which is located next to Port Authority and on the ground floor of the New York Times building, generates high volume but also has high employee turnover, according to Starbucks Workers United.
In addition to traditional barista tasks, the Starbucks employees also have to help customers navigate the Amazon Go technology without any additional pay, the union said. And some workers told the union that they were involuntarily transferred to the store as the company scrambled for baristas to staff the location.
