Coffee Break

Gross and others announced in 2004 their intention to unionize through the IWW, an organization known for militancy during its heyday in the '20s. This might seem an unlikely choice -- the union is tiny these days -- but the Wobblies, as they're known, allowed Gross and his comrades to negotiate directly with Starbucks, and didn't require certification votes at each store that would bestow upon the group official status in the eyes of the company.

The company has never considered any of the nine stores in question to be actual union shops. Official or not, though, Starbucks seemed eager to stop this union concept before it gained momentum. Its efforts led to litigation, which in 2006 culminated with the company signing a consent decree in which it promised it wouldn't threaten union supporters with negative performance reviews or transfers to other stores. Nor would it create the impression that "union activities are under surveillance."

Given this saga, and the more recent NLRB findings, Gross says that what bothers him most is the gap between what the company is and what everyone believes it to be. Case in point: It's Starbucks policy to offer health-care coverage to any employee who puts in at least 240 hours per quarter. Sounds great. But just 42 percent of employees are covered through the company, according to figures provided by Starbucks. Wal-Mart actually does better -- it covers 46 percent of its employees.

One reason that Starbucks insures fewer employees than Wal-Mart, Gross says, is because it lags the Bentonville behemoth in one other surprising area. Wal-Mart has taken a lot of grief for allegedly trying to boost the percentage of its workforce in part-time positions -- a move that reduces benefits costs. It'll never catch Starbucks. One hundred percent of its baristas -- and shift supervisors, too -- are part-timers.

O'Neil, the Starbucks spokeswoman, says the "part-time" designation is a matter of semantics as far as the workers are concerned, since it doesn't affect hourly wages -- you work a 40-hour week, you get paid for 40 hours, regardless of what you're called. As for the health-care issue, she said that many employees declined coverage because they're in a parent's or spouse's plan or -- here it comes -- they're covered by a second job. The more important figure, she argued, is 91 percent, which is the portion of employees covered, one way or another. That includes Medicaid, the federal insurance program for poor people.

Members of the SWU contend that requiring all baristas to work part time not only keeps down the company health care costs, it hands vast leverage to managers, who can punish those who complain by scheduling them for fewer hours. They also say that working too many hours is high on the company's list of no-nos.

"I once worked 43 hours in a week," says Seth Deitz, a union member in the Rockville store, "and my boss disciplined me. She was like, 'Don't do that again.' "

Ben Reinhart was dismissed from his barista gig at a Gaithersburg Starbucks about five years ago. Today he works for a construction company, but joined the tiny protest at Dupont Circle last evening.

"You couldn't get any kind of strict schedule," he recalled of his time at Starbucks. "You had to compete with fellow workers for hours, and this led to a horrible environment."

The all-part-time barista force might, in fact, be one of the secrets to Starbucks's success, but for reasons that the SWU doesn't talk much about. In interviews with about 20 employees, most said they were quite pleased with their jobs, and one guy crowed about the health-care benefits, which cost him $36 a month. (The majority of baristas wouldn't talk; the company instructs employees not to speak to the media.) Most made about $9 an hour.

Either because the wages are so low or because a full-time position isn't in the cards, nobody who spoke said they intend a career behind the steam nozzle.

When grievances were voiced, they were not exactly the kind that send workers to the ramparts.

"I hate this apron," said a woman who declined to give her name. "I like wearing nice stuff."

Maybe low expectations are exactly what a Starbucks employee ought to have. Perhaps the point of a job there, as at any quick-service franchise, is to offer people an entry-level rung on the employment ladder, or a stopgap measure while studying for a graduate degree. There may be very few people who look at the Frappuccino blender the way that Gross's grandfather looked at his truck.

Gross is unmoved. "This is the direction the economy is heading," he says with a shrug. And it's a part of the economy he intends to rejoin. Once a lawyer, he plans to work for a public interest law firm. But one of his many goals is to force Starbucks to put him back on the payroll. So if all goes according to plan, in a few months Gross will be a rather exotic specimen in the labor market -- a barista with a law degree.

"They fired me illegally," he said, smiling but totally serious, "and I want my job back."

Special correspondent Chris Richards contributed to this story from Washington.