Dear Coffee Drinker,
With nearly 20,000 retail stores in
over 60 countries, Starbucks is the most
popular and widespread coffeehouse chain on the planet. In the past decade,
Starbucks has paved the way for the modern corporate coffeehouse industry with
its alleged commitment to “ethical sourcing”, “sustainability”, and
consistently strong promotional marketing.
Unfortunately, while Starbucks has
widely touted “ethical sourcing” and “sustainability” in their marketing
material, they’ve failed to live up to the hype in reality. Right now,
Starbucks is serving milk to millions of customers every day from factory farms
along with baked good products chock full of genetically engineered
ingredients.
As
if that weren’t bad enough, as a dues paying member of the Grocery
Manufacturers Association (GMA), Starbucks has helped lead the charge
against openness and transparency in our food system by fighting against common sense GMO labeling in the U.S.
In the past 2 years alone, Starbucks has been a part of a GMA-led
coalition that has donated more than $70 million dollars to defeat GMO labeling
efforts in California and Washington State. During 2012, the GMA donated $2
million to defeat Prop 37 in California and last year, the GMA illegally donated $11 million as a part
of a secret slush fund to defeat I-522 in Washington.
By
opposing GMO labeling, Starbucks has willingly climbed in bed with Monsanto and
the GMA and is intentionally misleading customers about their commitment
to “sustainability” and “ethical sourcing”.
On Starbucks’ company website they
state:
“We
have always believed Starbucks can – and should — have a positive impact on the
communities we serve. One person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.”
We agree, and that sounds great in
theory, but what about the fact that Starbucks serves milk for their lattes and
cappuccinos from cows on factory farms? We know from living in Iowa that
factory farms are not sustainable and not a positive impact on our communities
where they pollute our water supply, degrade our soil and depopulate rural
towns.
And while we’re impressed with
Starbucks’ online “Ethical Sourcing” pledge, which states:
“We’re
committed to offering high-quality, ethically purchased and responsibly
produced products”
…we think they fall frighteningly short
by selling dairy products from factory farms where animals are fed genetically
engineered grains and given sub-therapeutic doses of antibiotics. This is not
our idea of sustainable!
At Food Democracy Now! we think that
Starbucks could be a force of good and true “ethical sourcing”, instead of
promoting the industrial agriculture paradigms of factory farms and Monsanto’s
pesticides and GMOs. In order to do this, Starbucks needs to transition away
from the factory farm model and support local, regional and organic dairy
farmers.
If Starbucks could commit to that, like
they have with sourcing their fair trade coffee, rural America could benefit
from a resurgence in small and mid-sized organic dairy farms and Starbucks’
customers could help them lead the way by demanding this important change.
It’s time that major companies like
Starbucks are held accountable for their unsustainable and unethical choices
that conflict with their own marketing hype. We can’t let them get away with
it, just because the mainstream media refuses to do their job and report the
truth.
Remember, democracy is like a muscle,
use it or lose it!
Thanks for participating in food
democracy,
Dave, Lisa and the Food Democracy Now! team
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