Starbucks To Baristas: Let Your Tattoos Hang Out!
Your average Starbucks barista’s appearance might change. The powers that be at Starbucks are looking to possibly revise their rule of making employees hide their tattoos. Perhaps it’s a large corporation recognizing a huge artistic shift in generation Y and generation X. It wouldn’t be surprising given that some corporate offices accept the showing of tattoos these days.
Currently, the dress code includes polo shirts, black or tan dress pants, the green Starbucks apron, no piercings or perfume, and absolutely no tattoos, but now Seattle Times is reporting that tattoos might be acceptable in an effort to keep the morale high in the environment.
An e-mail was sent by Chief Operating Officer Troy Alstead about baristas possibly being able to show off their tattoos. After the e-mail had been sent, many Starbucks employees had their own opinions to share on the matter. One person wrote, “I live on Capitol Hill, Seattle. It’s rare to see someone without a tattoo here.” That said, the same person said anything that might be distracting should be covered up — this includes facial tattoos or “gang related” tattoos.
If this tattoo rule changes the tatt’d up baristas may want to thank Kristie Williams, a Starbucks barista who started a petition to alter the rule. The petition which was published on Coworker.org collected 21,652 signatures.
An employee of a branch at South Lake Union said the following, “People expect baristas to have tattoos.”
Some people thought the whole thing was pretty archaic.
It’s 2014 and @Starbucks is still worried that they will lose business because a barista has an anchor tattoo on their wrist?
— Craig Hlavaty (@CraigHlavaty) September 11, 2014
Starbucks to relax “no tattoo” rule? Great! Now they’ll look like Urban Outfitters with espresso machines. — Neal Boortz (@Talkmaster) September 11, 2014
@KHOU Companies still have bans on tattoos? What is this, 1980?
— #ClutchCity (@ClutchCityTexas) September 11, 2014
@Talkmaster I couldn’t tell that they had such a rule. — Jeff Scott (@jeffscottshow) September 11, 2014
@YouthAndWork I’ve written one before. It’s about whether we should ban discrimination based on personal appearance.
— David Doorey (@TheLawofWork) September 11, 2014
Not mentioning the petition at all, spokesman Zack Huston said that the “no tattoo rule” discussion is an attempt to engage employees.
“We are always actively engaged in discussion with our partners to determine how to make their Starbucks experience better and more valuable to them. We know the dress code and tattoo policy is important to them so we are taking a fresh look at it.”
[Image via Rob Wilson / Shutterstock.com]
