The Greencastle Starbucks store manager who decided that baristas' tips from September and October should go to charity recently left the company to start her own business. (Eyebrow raised.) She claims that everyone was on board with the plan.
"Not one single one of our employees said, 'Oh, so we're not going to get to keep our tips?'" said Deb Gould. "The team has embraced the whole idea."
I bet.
Baristas lost out on $1,250 in tips.
Surprised nobody had her arrested for theft. It wasn't her money.
Posted by: Herman | November 26, 2012 at 04:46 PM
Shesh. If my partners wanted to give their tips to charity, I would happily support their decision to do whatever they wanted with their money - but I sure as heck wouldn't touch it or encourage others to follow. It is just too much of a headache doing anything with tips beyond giving them to the people who earned them.
Posted by: Barista Ben | November 26, 2012 at 06:42 PM
no offence, but $1250 for two months worth of tips?! that's about $9/week for each of the 17 partners. no wonder they were willing to give it up for charity - it's a pittance anyway :)
Posted by: Just saying | November 26, 2012 at 08:19 PM
Yay, another tip post! ;)
As someone who works (serving Starbucks coffee!) where we DON'T get tips, I think it's awesome that this happened. It's not like this is going to be a regular occurrence. It's the holidays! To help an ANIMAL SHELTER.
Come on, Grinches. Let your heart grow, just this once. It wasn't even YOUR tips.
Posted by: Martha | November 27, 2012 at 06:53 AM
When I still worked for Starbucks we did something similar BUT it was our pennies. When rolling tips each week, we would take all of the pennies and put them aside in tip bags in a big bucket. When the bucket got full we either donated the money to a charity, or most often bought items for charities to give to underprivileged people in our area.
Posted by: bulkybarista | November 27, 2012 at 02:31 PM
Ehh...I'm not on board with this. At 30-35 hours/week and $1.50/tip per hour, that's $200 in a month. I do donate to charity but not THAT much.
Posted by: David | November 27, 2012 at 02:59 PM
What a horrible thing for the manager to do. It's an abuse of power.
It's likely that nobody spoke out against this idea because they were intimidated. Anyone expressing disagreement risks alienating their boss, losing their hours, having an unpleasant work environment, etc.
Maybe someone would want to give to a different charity. Maybe they would rather support a disease charity than an animal shelter. Maybe they would rather buy their own dog a toy or save for a rainy day. Whatever they do with their money, it should be their choice, not their boss's choice.
There should be a corporate policy preventing managers from doing things like this.
Posted by: Venti Urnex Latte | November 27, 2012 at 05:16 PM
Any manager who even proposes this should be fired immediately. I guarantee you that at least one of these partners felt coerced into doing this. I say this knowing full well that this is most likely a very worthy charity. However, it is difficult to believe that a bunch of people making $20,000 or less a year donated that much money and no one had a problem with it. Maybe I'm just being cynical.
Posted by: Tired of This | November 27, 2012 at 09:06 PM
Two other noteworthy things here:
One is that the reporter has no comment from Starbucks corporate. Considering how there have been several lawsuits over tips, it seems there should be an official comment. Partners are taxed on imputed tip income, so they are being taxed for money unreceived.
Two is that the former manager's business is named "Legendary Service Solutions." The Starbucks mantra is "legendary service." I don't believe this phrase is trademarked, so she is probably safe from a lawsuit.
Posted by: Venti Urnex Latte | November 27, 2012 at 10:29 PM
How come the Managers always want to donate employee tips but I have never heard any SM or otherwise volunteer to donate their bonus?
Posted by: short drip | November 28, 2012 at 10:20 AM
While it is a great thought to donate to charity, I don't agree that it's a great idea to have a "store policy" to donate ALL tips. I do not know what actually took place at the specific SBUX location, but regardless, there must have been some form of peer pressure involved in reaching a consensus. Partners who did not want to jump into giving their earned tips to a charity would automatically be stigmatized as a grinch. Who would want to work in an environment where you would be labeled as an arse for not wanting to donate? But then again, the pitiful tip amount the partners earn at that location must have softened the blow...
Posted by: SirenSong | November 28, 2012 at 11:54 AM
@Short Drip-
Actually, last year my manager at the time donated his bonus to our tips feeling that since we'd helped him earn it, he didn't deserve to keep it all. He didn't even tell us he had donated it, we only figured it out when our tips were extra high and he had posted a thank you note in the back room.
Posted by: Anon | November 29, 2012 at 07:19 AM
When I was a barista, I used my tips on things like food if I wanted to eat out during the week and laundry money. Often, the tips went toward groceries or bills.
If any of the managers I worked under had suggested this, I would have been offended if they weren't willing to put up a good amount of their own money first to set the example.
Managers salaried and make more a year than the baristas who work under them. So of course it would have been easy for the manager to suggest giving up tips for two months.
Posted by: FormerVanBarista | November 30, 2012 at 01:34 PM
It should be noted that this is a licensed store - not a corporate store.
Posted by: Georgia Latte | November 30, 2012 at 07:15 PM
The manager donated his bonus to your tips? What a dummy.
Posted by: Grande Latte | December 02, 2012 at 09:40 PM
"The Greencastle Starbucks store manager who decided that baristas' tips from September and October should go to charity"
Excuse me? Not her money. She's not even allowed to set a finger on it. I remember that quite vividly from my time wearing the green apron. Managers were not to count it, divvy it up, or in any way have anything to do with the tips.
Posted by: The Moar You Know | December 05, 2012 at 02:32 PM
I'm a Starbucks employee and have been pressured into giving my tips to a religious charity. When I say pressured, I was required to sign a form saying I was OK with it, and I was put on the spot. We are also having a store party where instead of doing secret santa we're asked to give "whatever we can afford" to the very same charity. Does anyone else find this morally wrong?? Should I say something??
Posted by: Partner | December 06, 2012 at 10:07 PM
" Should I say something?? "
Yes.
Posted by: SarahB | December 07, 2012 at 08:17 AM
Parter -- please contact me at starbucksgossip@yahoo.com . I want to know more about this tips-to-religious-charity thing. That sounds troublesome. Please drop me a line so I can discuss it further.
Posted by: Starbucks Gossip webmaster | December 07, 2012 at 10:16 AM
@Partner - call the partner hotline. The number should be posted in the back room and in the duty roster and/or cash book.
Posted by: baristamatron | December 07, 2012 at 06:42 PM
@partner, yes, say something. Say it here if need be:
https://businessconduct.eawebline.com/
Posted by: imout | December 10, 2012 at 03:54 PM