“We’re over labor” = “i’m at risk of not getting my bonus for minimizing labor, so we need to cut some shifts”

My store is basically permanently under staffed, especially later in the day after peak, but my SM is still looking to cut a shift and keeps trying to cut expenses in small insignificant ways (stuff that cant be saving more than a $5 a month. SMs get bonuses for keeping labor and expenses under certain thresholds. Starbucks (along with basically every other food chain) is just incentivising understaffing.

The fact that we have to have conversations about “labor” is fucked up. Give us the fucking people needed to run the store properly.

Calls-outs still count towards the labor budget if they use sick hours/vacation maybe?

The company doesn’t want to explain to its “partners” how labor hours vs sales work other than to say “sell more and you’ll get more hours” despite it not being so.

^ this is true its for the managers honestly by cutting hours it's the minimum to survive but when u get busy everyone's gonna be over worked. Partner moral would be down amd honestly I'll rather help the partners cause there the ones that are running the store and when Over worked there gonna get drained out Lil by Lil if SM has a problem they can schedule better so they get there bonus

Yes!! I’m so over it too, which is exactly why I gave my 2 weeks notice. Cutting labor is bs. We’re understaffed to begin with, and then the moment an SM notices they’re at risk of not reaching particular metrics they start slashing hours more and sending people home early. I can’t even really blame the SM all that much, it’s more the company’s fault for setting up stupid metric numbers for SMs to reach.

It’s silly. The way I see it is we run around and kill ourselves trying to get everything done and provide a positive experience for customers, all while understaffed yet still have to get the same amount of things done regardless and it’s more work for everyone with less people working, and for what? We aren’t paid extra to work understaffed shifts, it’s corporate who gets the extra money we earn for them.

It’s sick, and I’ve seen this job take its toll on so many amazing people and honestly it’s sad. People that were so optimistic and energetic began to have breakdowns, were always stressed, and beyond exhausted and drained.

To me, one of the worst parts about it is this job could be enjoyable and fun IF WE WERE PROPERLY STAFFED. But that’s far from reality. I love making drinks and interacting with customers! But not when the store is endlessly dirty, nothing is restocked, there’s a mountain of dirty dishes, I’m my own CS having to run to the back for things, and I’m trying to do the job of 3 people all while making an endless line of drinks. They’re always finding ways to do more with less, and we get absolutely no benefits from it, instead we’re simply used. It’s a vicious cycle: morning crew can’t get things done because they’re slammed during peak and barely can even get through breaks while managing store operations, and night crew can’t get things done because the moment the morning crew leaves it drops down to barely enough partners to stay afloat for the evening. No wonder the store is a mess, not clean at all, nothing is restocked, and no backups are done. That’s not any of our faults as partners, it’s the fault of a system that is built to fail us but brings in more $$$.

Why would those at the top care? They don’t have to wear an apron and experience life behind the counter, they just get to enjoy all the extra profit our hard work earns for them.

I’m beyond over it. Time and time again, I’ve tried to find things to hang onto at this company: awesome partners, funny moments, free drinks/food, the joy of feeling creative while making drinks. But that all fades to nothing in the current reality of this job and company.

It’s no longer in any way enjoyable when we’re all exhausted, berated by customers because of unrealistic expectations set by the company we work for which are then planted into minds of customers as they begin to expect a certain experience (magically and unrealistically quick, but super friendly baristas who have the time and energy to connect), and the culture of a coffee shop is totally lost. How is it supposed to be enjoyable when we NEVER have the minimum amount of people needed working to simply get necessary tasks done, let alone cleaning tasks and giving customers positive experiences.

Anything the company does is so clearly ignorant of the partner experience. Training? Lol yeah, anything in those courses is meant for a properly staffed store which isn’t reality. Portable cold foam blenders? How about a fully staffed shift? I need that more than a portable blender. And how about let’s move away from a million drink modifications and closer to what the company *used* to be about: coffee.

Sugar filled drinks and drive thrus? Cutting hours any way they can for more profit? What a wrong turn for the company, in my opinion at least. I’m done telling myself this company cares about us, that my mental/physical health will be okay here, or that this job is good for me because none of that is now true.

Let them know it hasn’t been easy on the floor!!!
The other day a proxy told me that she was taking a partner because she looked at my schedule and said I would be fine.

I ended up running a 3 person play (including myself). LIKE ONE TWO THREE people on the floor from 10am 3pm. I verbally expressed the next day that I was super stressed and didn’t have a good time at all. And that day, when I had a call out, she found me coverage.

Kinda random. But maybe that could help? It always sucks because they aren’t there experiencing the chaos. SM shifts are always a breeze and it’s a little unfair.

(Side opinion: SM should HAVE to work Saturday or Sunday. Weekends are nuts and usually they don’t work them)

they just want that bonus and don’t care about the actual people they employ

Labor is calculated by how many partners x how much they’re paid x hourly sales and dividing it by how many partners there are. Saying you’re over budget makes no sense to me if you have consistent call offs, training, non-coverage, and partners going home early, then there’s no way you’re over budget. Starbucks makes decent sales too.

SSV point of view: forecasted and earned labor is different than your DMs goal for labor. I had an asshole DM who constantly pulled that shit and would scrape by with the least amount of staffing possible. Then, once people quit or got sick, there was literally no one to help and the stores in her district were constantly closed.

Curious as to how you “track labor?” as an SSV? What exactly are you looking at to track it?

I’d ask them if they could go over the weekly labor recap with you, to help alleviate some of the misunderstanding you’re seeing. When you send people off the floor for training etc, are they coded for those hours? When people cover for others, sometimes their coded hours won’t be swapped onto their line (someone covers for clean play or for a shift doing the counts).

You also mention a nearby store is closed and you’re busier because of it; maybe ask gently if the schedule added on hours to make sure you could help those regulars stopping at yours instead.

Just a few recommendations, but I’d start by asking if your SM could go over a Weekly Labor Recap with you so they can explain how they track everything

Small thing, but might help (because yea the math doesn’t make sense)- are people clocking out? If there are open punches it will eff with your labor. Our dm called my sm one time because we were like 30 hrs over and we had a bunch of open punches.

Same thing at my store unfortunately. Understaffed on top of callouts and sick days and vacation time, and somehow we have “enough partners for our sales” and are “going over the amount of hours we can schedule people” even though we are struggling to run breaks and complete the pull smoothly.

Hey guys you can see your forecasted labor and actual labor on my daily. You also have customer count goals daily which is on your dcr. Usually when you hit the forecast customer count you earn that labor. As a manager I’ll never manage the hours like that. I normally look into deployment, partners following roles and routines, and station layouts if my team feels understaffed and The system says I’m over in labor. I forgot how the quote went with Howard Shultz but pretty much he says you never chase the numbers. You do the necessary work and the numbers are the result of the work you do.

As a shift at a store who recently inherited baristas and shifts from a neighboring store under construction, your store gets extra labor for those borrowed partners. My SM actually made a point of enjoying the extra labor given by those partners and allowing us some more wiggle room in the day

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