‘This is a national movement’: union drives surge at US Starbucks stores

Supporters hold signs in support of workers of two Seattle Starbucks locations that announced plans to unionize, in Washington state on 25 January. Photograph: Jason Redmond/AFP/Getty Images

A union organizing drive among workers at corporate run Starbucks stores, the largest coffeehouse chain in the world, has surged in recent weeks throughout the US, organizers and workers say.

The development comes in the wake of union election victories at two of three stores in the Buffalo, New York, area that held union votes with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in December.