Starbucks baristas in Columbia, Maryland vote to unionize 19-3
Columbia baristas won their union election 19-3 at Wilde Lake Village Center, adding another Maryland store to Starbucks Workers United’s contract push.
Baristas at the Starbucks in Columbia’s Wilde Lake Village Center voted 19-3 to unionize, giving Starbucks Workers United another store in its national contract campaign and adding fresh pressure on the company’s labor playbook in Maryland.
The workers said they were organizing over the conditions they live with on the floor: low pay, inadequate protections and chaotic scheduling. Starbucks Workers United, which describes itself as a worker-led union of more than 12,000 Starbucks partners, celebrated the Columbia result and cast it as a pushback against union-busting. WBAL NewsRadio 1090 and FM 101.5 said the Wilde Lake Village Center store would now turn to negotiating a union contract.
For baristas, the practical stakes are immediate. A union store can press harder on the issues that shape every shift, including hours, schedule predictability, staffing levels, workload during rushes, break timing and workplace safety. That matters in Starbucks stores where mobile orders, drive-thru timing and short staffing can collide during peak periods and leave partners scrambling to keep service moving.
The Columbia win also lands in the middle of a broader organizing run across the chain. Baltimore’s North Charles Street Starbucks became the first Maryland location to unionize in April 2022. In March 2026, baristas at Annapolis Harbour Center voted to unionize, giving Annapolis its first Starbucks union store. In May 2026, a Starbucks in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, also voted to unionize, and WHNT News 19 said it was the fourth Starbucks in Alabama to take that step and the first in the Shoals.
Starbucks Workers United has been building leverage store by store while the company faces continuing labor pressure. In October 2025, the union moved toward a strike-authorization vote, and in March 2026 it sent Starbucks a contract proposal. Against that backdrop, the Columbia result is more than a local win for 22 workers at one cafe. It adds another bargaining unit to the campaign and gives nearby nonunion stores another example of a small, steep election margin turning into an organizing foothold.
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