The Great Barista Rescue

So Saturday I was sitting at the Starbucks near my wife's office reading about the Katrina crisis and drinking a cup of Breakfast Blend.

I'll pause here to give all you Starbucks haters time to compose an eloquent missive about how I'm a bad liberal and a cooperate tool because I like my coffee to actual be drinkable.

Ok. Times up. Back to my story.

I look up and notice the manager of the Starbucks talking to 4 collage age kids. Turns out the kids are Katrina refugees and Starbucks employees. Yes, that's right 'refugee baristas'. They got out of New Orleans with the close on their backs and not much else. Three of them had just reached Austin that morning. The other had gotten into town the night before.

Over the next hour and a half I watch a quite but important rescue operation in progress. The manager walks the 4 refugee baristas through some paper work and hands each of them an emergency assistance check from Starbucks. Another Starbucks employee shows up with a SUV full of donated clothing that the displaced baristas are lead outside to pick through. Then it's back inside to start the process of finding housing and transportation for the 4.

When clothing, shelter, and transportation are out of the way the manager sits down with the four again and gets each of them scheduled to work. It's an small but amazing thing to watch and the reaction of the three baristas who had just arrived that day make it clear that it's an important thing as well.

By any measure, these four kids were lucky: they were able to get out of New Orleans, they were able to make it to a great town like Austin, and they worked for a company who decided it was important to take care of them. But no way did they have it easy. I watched one of the Barista's faces go from shock to amazement to tears when she tore open an envelope the manager handed her and found a check from Starbucks inside.

Like I said earlier, the crying barista was one of the lucky ones. By that I mean she had probably lost everything and she had probably spent 4 days in something close to hell not knowing when it would end. But at the end of those four days there was someone waiting to help her find a bed and a room and hand her a check. But her tears confussed me for a little bit untill I realised her world had just gone from chaos back to a level of basically security that we all pretty much take for granted. For her opening an envelope and finding a check waiting inside was the moment when she realized she was safe again. It was no small thing.

When the refugees were all squared away, I went up to talk to the manager and see if there was any way my wife and I could help out. The manager was shocked but delighted. She told me that all the refugee baristas needed bedding and pillows and some toiletry items. My wife and I were delighted to be able to help out by picking that stuff up.

There weren't any signs up saying that Starbucks was running it's own rescue and relief effort and I haven't seen any since, but Starbucks deserves a lot of credit for taking care of it's employees like this. So the next time your out dropping off donations, doing some volunteer work, or whatever, don't forget to stop off at your local Starbucks, spring for a coffee and a muffin, throw some money in the tip jar, and ask how the refugee baristas are doing.

Just one afterthought: It was around noon when I witnessed all this. Three of the baristas had gotten into town that morning and Starbucks already had relief checks waiting for them, potential housing lined up, and an SUV full of donated clothing waiting. When we finally get rid of the incompetent boobs who are currently running FEMA, maybe we should hire some folks from Starbucks to take over. Just a thought.