Photo by Varun Gaba
Last week, Starbucks faced retaliation across social media after stating that employees weren’t allowed to wear attire including shirts and pins mentioning Black Lives Matter, according to an internal bulletin originally reported by Buzzfeed News.
#BoycottStarbucks began trending on Twitter following the report. And as several spoke out against Starbucks, including current and past employees, the company reversed their stance a day after the policy surfaced online, also adding they would give a quarter of a million shirts to company-operated partners to show support toward Black Lives Matter, according to Forbes.
The company pointed this was due to its original policy asking employees to not wear items that advocate for personal, religious and political issues, but one staffer told Buzzfeed that Starbucks has allowed employees to wear items supporting LGBTQ+ rights for this Pride month.
To follow up on the backlash, Starbucks also released a statement on Friday, June 12, saying, “We see you. We hear you. Black Lives Matter. That is a fact and will never change.”
