Workers at four Ann Arbor Sweetwaters Coffee & Tea locations announced that they filed to unionize with the National Labor Relations Board in an Instagram post Thursday evening. The workers at the Michigan Union, West Washington Street, Westgate Library and Meijer Ann Arbor-Saline Road locations will be organizing together as a single bargaining unit, with the goals of increasing pay, improving benefits and creating a clearer process for firing employees. The locations will be represented by Teamsters Local 243, the local chapter of the international union International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
Employees’ primary concern is that their current wages are not enough to support the high cost of living in Ann Arbor. According to Levi Pierpont, Westgate Library Sweetwaters barista, base pay for baristas, not including tips, is $12 an hour at the corporate locations and $13 an hour at the University of Michigan Union location. The wages at the Michigan Union location were raised $1 after employees bargained for a pay increase because they were not receiving tips proportional to those at other locations. In an email to The Michigan Daily, Sweetwaters co-founder Lisa Bee said with tips, the baristas make between $16.40 and $21.00 per hour.
In an email to The Daily, Megan McKinnon, Michigan Union Sweetwaters senior team leader, wrote that she has never made more than $18.70 per hour, after tips and before taxes. McKinnon wrote that her base pay is $15 per hour, so her co-workers who have a lower base pay make less.
Lisa and Wei Bee are the co-founders of Sweetwaters and own the four Ann Arbor locations that are unionizing. Pierpont said he felt frustrated with the co-founders after hearing that Wei told a team member he does not believe student employees need to be paid high wages.
“Wei said, ‘It’s so nice because, since there are so many students, we really don’t need to pay that much because they don’t really need a job. They don’t have to worry about rent … ’ ” Pierpont said. “(They were) essentially expressing an idea that student workers are only working for some cash on the side and when I heard that, I was so frustrated. … All of us that are working are working because we have to. … We know that Sweetwaters can pay us more and they just simply refuse to.”
An employee of Sweetwaters who requested anonymity for fear of retribution told The Daily that in addition to increased pay, team members would like clearer policies in regards to firing. The employee, who will be referred to as Alex, said there have been multiple cases of quiet firing, or the practice of giving an employee reduced hours until they no longer work.
“Management would find a reason to dislike someone or want them to not be on the team anymore and instead of firing them or telling them outright … they would (quiet) fire that person,” Alex said. “They would reduce their hours either gradually or all at once and just not schedule them at all, instead of just outright saying ‘Hey, find a different job.’ ”
The baristas are also unionizing for better benefits and more dependable scheduling, according to the Instagram post.
Isabel Hoadley, Michigan Union Sweetwaters team leader, said the unionization efforts first began in the summer, when employees wrote a letter to the founders requesting substantial changes in pay and other company policies.
“Over the summer we wrote this letter to the owners and we asked for more pay and more consistent scheduling and a fair discipline system,” Hoadley said. “(The owners) didn’t really care and they kept pushing off times to meet us and so it kind of fizzled out.”
Aeil Maurizio, former Michigan Union Sweetwaters barista and co-chair of solidarity with the Ypsilanti chapter of Industrial Workers of the World, a union organization group, said there were multiple meetings scheduled over the summer after the team sent the letter, but they kept getting canceled. Eventually, employees felt the only way to make the changes they wanted was to form a union, according to Maurizio.
“(The owners) didn’t seem to make (our meeting) a priority,” Maurizio said. “Then none of the demands that we issued were met. They didn’t seem like they were trying to make any changes. It made it clear to a lot of us that they’re not going to listen to us unless we organize and form a union.”
Sweetwaters baristas’ push to unionize follows other recent labor organizing actions in the Ann Arbor area, including the unionization of four Starbucks locations in June 2022 and the United Auto Workers contract agreements with Detroit’s Big Three automakers.
After the unionization announcement, Bee sent a message obtained by The Daily to employees, saying she and the other co-founder felt hurt by the employees’ decision to unionize.
“(The other founder) and I want to emphasize how shocking and hurtful this has been to both of us and to all the managers that have worked side by side with you,” Bee wrote.
The letter also offered an explanation to what signing a union card means and detailed steps for employees to withdraw their union cards.
Alex said they feel the letter was written to persuade employees not to join the union, but do not think it will make much of a difference. According to Alex, most workers have already expressed support for the union, and the letter only further indicated a lack of support from management.
“(The letter) made me almost kind of double down,” Alex said. “It had the reverse effect of what they thought it would because I feel it’s so easy (to see), from the wordage and the rhetoric in the message … they’re trying to persuade their workers to vote in (the company’s) best interests.”
In an email to The Daily, Bee expressed her surprise at the workers’ decision to unionize. Bee said she felt the business has done its best to support team members and that a union is not necessary.
“We don’t know a lot about unions because we never thought we would be faced by this kind of situation,” Bee wrote. “I can’t describe my surprise when I was presented with a petition to unionize. It is something we are taking very seriously. … We have always strived to do our best for our diverse teams within our cafes and the community in which we live. We are not against unions. We just don’t believe one is necessary here at Sweetwaters.”
Pierpont said he believes the owners need to take responsibility, listen to their employees’ concerns and make changes.
“They’re trying to play this game where they’re trying to either blame us for being too greedy or blaming the customer for being too stingy,” Pierpont said. “They are never willing to accept accountability and responsibility and realize that they are very wealthy business owners when it really comes down to it.”
Daily News Editor Rebecca Lewis can be reached at rebeccl@umich.edu.