![]() “I wanted to work for a company where I felt like I was safe,” said Shep Searl, who is nonbinary and has worked for Starbucks for close to seven years. Starbucks has long presented itself as a progressive and pro-LGBTQ company, which some baristas said is what attracted them to work for the coffee giant in the first place. The Starbucks union drive is “one of the queerest union campaigns I’ve ever seen,” said Jerame Davis, executive director of Pride at Work, a national AFL-CIO constituency group for LGBTQ+ workers. Last year, close to 14% of new union filings in the Chicago area came out of Starbucks cafes. (Shanna Madison/Chicago Tribune)Ĭhicago’s union coffeehouses now include cafes run by Intelligentsia Coffee and Colectivo Coffee, where baristas are represented by the IBEW, and La Colombe, where staff are unionized with the United Food and Commercial Workers. Click here to support Block Club with a tax-deductible donation.Cat Robbins writes “Honk For Workers Rights” on a piece of cardboard during a Starbucks barista union strike on June 9, 2023, in Chicago. Every dime we make funds reporting from Chicago’s neighborhoods. Thanks for subscribing to Block Club Chicago, an independent, 501(c)(3), journalist-run newsroom. Every dime we make funds reporting from Chicago’s neighborhoods.Ĭlick here to support Block Club with a tax-deductible donation. Subscribe to Block Club Chicago, an independent, 501(c)(3), journalist-run newsroom. ![]() “We thank everyone for the support over the years.” “This was our first home,” Merchant said. Some equipment will be moved out by then, but it will give customers a chance to say good-bye. Pressure’s last day of business will be Super Bowl Sunday. “We’ve showed the side that’s recreational and family fun rather than intimidating,” he said. Adding a cafe to Pressure helped pave the way for the Surge brand, which includes a coffee bar at the Albany Park location and desserts in jars in Logan Square, Merchant said. With Pressure, Merchant said he sought to change the reputation of pool halls as adult-only hangout spots to family-friendly community gathering spaces. In 2020, they opened Surge Billiards in Logan Square. Since then, Merchant and his wife, Kareeshma Ali, opened Surge Coffee Bar and Billiards in Albany Park. Merchant opened Pressure in September 2005, choosing to open in Edgewater after growing up in Rogers Park. ![]() My appreciation for the neighborhood is huge.” “We decided to focus on our other ventures,” he said. Pressure closed for more than six months at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, and the business had trouble getting back on its feet, Merchant said. The business’s lease was ending, and Merchant decided to consolidate and focus on his pool halls in Albany Park and Logan Square. It ends a run for the local business that opened in 2005 and helped launch a chain of pool halls on the North Side.Īfter two years of a pandemic that has wrought havoc on local businesses, owner Wahib Merchant said the time had come to close Pressure. EDGEWATER - Pressure Billiards and Cafe will have one last weekend in business after 16 years in the neighborhood.
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