Advertisement
Internet Culture

‘They do everything as a publicity stunt’: Former Starbucks worker says employees donated their free coffee bags to the troops—and Starbucks took credit

‘Starbucks partners get one free bag a week as part of our benefits, and what we did was, we donated our weekly coffee mark out to the troops.’

Photo of Moises Mendez II

Moises Mendez II

Former 10-year Starbucks employee reveals secret on TikTok

A TikToker who says she’s worked at Starbucks for 10 years spoke out against the company in a viral TikTok video.

Featured Video

In the video, TikToker Christine Kominek blasts the company and claims they “do everything for PR.”

Kominek says in her video that Starbucks “doesn’t really care about anyone or care about anything. They do everything as a publicity stunt.”

To bolster her case against the company, she uses an example of when Starbucks claimed to have sent 20,000 bags of coffee to the troops in Iraq.

Advertisement

“Starbucks partners get one free bag a week as part of our benefits, and what we did was, we donated our weekly coffee mark out to the troops,” Kominek says in the video. “But Starbucks didn’t say anything about that.”

https://www.tiktok.com/@meanychristiney/video/7037269343436164358

The video garnered over 1 million views and over 192,000 likes in the 16 hours since it was posted. Komineck has gone viral before for other videos about her time as an employee and for hacks on how to get popular drinks for a good price. Most notably, she taught her followers how to order a cheaper version of the dirty chai.

Other TikTokers who likewise claimed to be Starbucks employees commented on Komineck’s videos about the other alleged unsavory actions that Starbucks has carried out.

Advertisement

“They had a huge meeting for store managers and hired John Legend to sing, cut our hours in half so they could pay for it,” one person commented.

Another said the store they worked at “never recycled” and that everything just went in the trash. “The best thing I ever did was quit,” someone else commented, to which the creator agreed with.

The Daily Dot has reached out to Christine Kominek and Starbucks.


Advertisement

Today’s top stories

‘Fill her up’: Bartender gives woman a glass of water when the man she’s with orders tequila shot
‘I don’t think my store has even sold one’: Whataburger employees take picture with first customer who bought a burger box
‘It was a template used by anyone in the company’: Travel agent’s ‘condescending’ out-of-office email reply sparks debate
Sign up to receive the Daily Dot’s Internet Insider newsletter for urgent news from the frontline of online.
 
The Daily Dot