Aug. 17—A wave of unionizing at Starbucks sites nationwide has made landfall in Santa Fe.

Employees of the coffee shop at

780 St. Michael's Drive, near the intersection with Calle Lorca, sent a letter Monday to Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz announcing they have filed a petition to unionize with the National Labor Relations Board. They join workers at more than 300 locations who have launched efforts to start unions since August 2021.

The action came the same day Starbucks Corp. filed a complaint accusing the National Labor Relations Board of misconduct by manipulating the election process and asked for union elections to be suspended pending the outcome of an investigation.

The St. Michael's location, built in 2019, is the first Starbucks store in

Santa Fe and the second in New Mexico to formally begin unionization efforts. A site on Rio Grande Boulevard in Albuquerque sent its letter to Schultz on July 11. According to Starbucks Workers United, based in Buffalo, N.Y., workers at 221 locations in 33 states have voted in favor of creating a union, while elections at 46 stores failed.

The Starbucks employees in Santa Fe wrote in their letter to Schultz, "We have been without proper support and management, and our ability to serve and connect with our customers has suffered for it. Amidst an ongoing pandemic, we have been asked to choose between our health and our paycheck. We have each been asked to carry the workload of two or more people on back-to-back shifts. ...

"While we are not ungrateful for the benefits Starbucks offers, we believe that the company as a whole can do better," the letter continued.

It was signed by several employees and was written on behalf of "others whose names have been omitted for fear of retaliation," the letter said.

Starbucks has a response to the union organizing efforts posted on the website one.starbucks.com.

"We know that recently we haven't lived up to what you should expect from Starbucks," the statement says. "There were external problems like the challenges brought on by the COVID pandemic, but also problems we created ourselves like not focusing enough on staffing, security, and operations. ... Simply put — there are two paths forward. We can work together, side by side. Or we can work with you through a third party across a negotiating table."

The first Starbucks union effort was announced

Aug. 30, 2021, in Buffalo, where employees voted in favor of a union Dec. 9. Employees at 11 Starbucks filed petitions to unionize 2021, and in 2022, dozens of stores each month have followed suit. Starbucks Workers United, the union's regional branch and the Albuquerque store that is organizing a union posted the Santa Fe workers' letter on Twitter and tweeted congratulatory messages.

If the local store's effort is successful, the group would become part of Starbucks Workers United but would negotiate its own contract.

The Starbucks workers' move follows similar efforts in the past two years at Meow Wolf and Outside magazine.