Since President Donald Trump's recent ban of refugees and citizens of certain, and mostly Muslim, countries, many people have been speaking up. Certain judicial staff in many states have been putting into order policies that go against Trump's plans in order to make the most for their Muslim communities. People have been raising hell outside of different Trump buildings in Washington D.C. and New York City, just to name a few places.
Companies have also been calling to take action against the recent ban on certain people entering the United States. Starbucks, the coffee powerhouse not known for staying out of controversy, released a statement on the morning of January 30 saying they were looking to hire 10,000 refugees to provide jobs and reasons for refugees to seek shelter in the United States.
Many Trump supporters have been using the hashtag "#BoycottStarbucks" because they feel this is going against the President's orders. The majority of Twitter and Facebook users that side with the boycotting of the coffee giant are putting the idea out there that Starbucks should instead hire 10,000 veterans of the United States military rather than focusing on hiring refugees. People that are saying this are missing one vital point however; Starbucks released a statement in 2013 that they're goal by the middle of 2014 was to hire 10,000 veterans and family members of veterans. The problem? Just under 8,000 veterans and their family members even applied for jobs, and the majority of them got it.
What point am I trying to make? The point that if you are a veteran or want to support veterans, seek a job out. Nobody is entitled to a company searching for them. These people need to search for jobs rather than sitting around waiting for opportunities to seek them out.
This also begs the question; is Starbucks in a deep pool of controversy for their statements or are they simply gaining free advertising? There is definitely something to be said about being in controversy. For example, they will probably lose a few customers here and there when those customers decide to side with Trump supporters and the #BoycottStarbucks movement. However, according to Starbucks reports from 2015, the company announced that it served on average 60 million customers every week. Every week. In a year, that's 3.12 billion customers. Of course, that is assuming that nobody ever returns and that every customer is entering a Starbucks establishment for the first time. This simply isn't the case, however in terms of money, 3.12 billion customers in a year with an average of five dollars being spent per customer is over 15 billion dollars of revenue for the company in a single year.
The last point I'm attempting to make here is that with a few Trump supporters that also support the boycotting of Starbucks, the company shouldn't be worrying whatsoever. They won't be losing much money, if any at all.
Keep on ordering your venti spiced lattes whenever you wish. If you like the taste, enjoy it while you can.
Yes yes yes! So happy someone decided to talk about this! You did a great job on shedding light to what's actually going on (despite how insane it is). Also, good job with the statistics. Of course Starbucks would like to gain more customers and of course they could get a bit controversial (as we go back to the big "red cup" debacle). But it's a company, it's what they do! Anyway, great job and good read!!
ReplyDeleteThanks! Yes, of course they want more customers, but they know they can afford some controversy because of how large of a company they are.
Delete