Raphael Stevens

Starbucks Workers United has voted to authorize a strike as the union seeks a contract with the coffee giant.
Both sides are slated to meet for their last scheduled bargaining session of the year.
In late February, Starbucks and the union announced they would work on a “foundational framework” on how to reach a collective bargaining agreement for stores.

A Starbucks worker boards the Starbucks union bus after Starbucks workers stood on the picket line with striking SAG-AFTRA and Writers Guild of America members in solidarity outside Netflix studios in Los Angeles on July 28, 2023.
Mario Tama | Getty Images

Starbucks Workers United said Tuesday that 98% of union baristas have voted to authorize a strike as they seek a contract with the coffee giant.
Bargaining delegates are set to return to negotiations with Starbucks on Tuesday in the last scheduled session of the year with the goal of agreeing on a “foundational framework.” Starbucks and Workers United have spent hundreds of hours this year at the bargaining table, and both sides have put forward dozens of tentative agreements, the union said in a press release.

However, hundreds of unfair labor practice cases still have not been settled, and the union said Starbucks has not yet proposed a comprehensive package that would address barista pay and other benefits.
In a statement to CNBC, Starbucks disputed the union’s characterization and said the company remains committed to reaching a final framework agreement.
“It is disappointing that the union is considering a strike rather than focusing on what have been extremely productive negotiations. Since April we’ve scheduled and attended more than eight multi-day bargaining sessions where we’ve reached thirty meaningful agreements on dozens of topics Workers United delegates told us were important to them, including many economic issues,” the company said in the statement.
The strike authorization shows that relations between the two sides may again be cooling, after thawing in late February when both parties said they found a “constructive path forward” though mediation. Prior to that point, Starbucks had fought the union boom that swept across its company-owned locations for more than two years. The company’s attempts to curb the union movement led to backlash from some consumers and lawmakers, culminating with former CEO Howard Schultz testifying on Capitol Hill.
Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol, who joined the company in September, committed to bargaining in good faith in a letter addressed to the union in his first weeks on the job.

Niccol announced on Monday that the company would double its paid parental leave, starting in March. However, baristas will reportedly receive a smaller annual pay hike next year than they have in previous years, following a sales slump at its U.S. locations.
More than 500 company-owned Starbucks cafes have voted to unionize under Workers United since the first elections that took place in Buffalo three years ago.

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Some Walmart employees are now wearing body cameras in U.S. stores as part of a pilot program.
The tech, widely deployed in law enforcement, is now being expanded into retail to help deter conflict and prevent theft.
TJX Companies said earlier this year that its loss prevention employees are using body cameras in some locations.

The Walmart logo is seen outside of one of its stores in Selinsgrove, Pennsylvania.
Paul Weaver | Lightrocket | Getty Images

Walmart has started giving store-level associates body cameras to wear as part of a pilot program at some of its U.S. locations, CNBC has learned. 
It’s not clear how many of Walmart’s stores have the recording devices, but some locations now have signs at entry points warning shoppers that it has “body-worn cameras in-use,” according to witnesses and photos posted online. 

In at least one store in Denton, Texas — about 40 miles north of Dallas — an associate checking receipts was seen wearing a yellow-and-black body camera earlier this month, according to a shopper who shared a photo with CNBC. 
“While we don’t talk about the specifics of our security measures, we are always looking at new and innovative technology used across the retail industry,” a Walmart spokesperson told CNBC. “This is a pilot we are testing in one market, and we will evaluate the results before making any longer-term decisions.”
Walmart, the largest nongovernmental employer in the U.S., is testing the technology after smaller retailers started trying body cameras at their own stores as a way to deter theft. Body cameras and the footage they gather are commonly advertised as a way to prevent shoplifting, but Walmart intends to use the tech for worker safety — not as a loss prevention tool, according to a person familiar with the program.
In a document titled “Providing great customer service while creating a safer environment,” staff are instructed on how to use the devices, according to a photo of the document posted on an online forum for Walmart employees and customers. It instructs employees to “record an event if an interaction with a customer is escalating” and to not wear the devices in employee break areas and bathrooms. After an incident occurs, staffers are told, they are to discuss it with another team member, who can help them log the event in the “ethics and compliance app,” according to the document. 
The body cameras at Walmart come during the thick of the holiday shopping season, when retail employees work long hours and face tough interactions with customers that can be more tense and hostile than usual. 

“There’s too much harassment that goes on throughout the year, but especially during the holiday season … it’s even worse,” said Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. “Everyone is stressed out. If they can’t find the item they’re looking for, they get upset and whom do they blame? They blame the shop worker.” 
However, it’s unclear whether body cameras actually help to deescalate conflict. Appelbaum, whose union does not represent Walmart employees but includes staff from retailers such as Macy’s and H&M, said the RWDSU is concerned that body cameras are more about surveillance and deterring theft than making employees safer.  
“Workers need training on deescalation. Workers need training on what to do during a hostile situation at work. The body camera doesn’t do that. The body camera doesn’t intervene,” said Appelbaum. “We need safe staffing and we need panic buttons.” 
Bianca Agustin, the co-executive director of United for Respect, a workers organization for Walmart and Amazon staffers, said the group has asked Walmart to provide more training for its employees but that the company hasn’t met those demands. She said body cameras could be part of the solution but cameras alone are “no substitute” for proper training.
“There’s a claim that the body cams are going to promote deescalation just organically. We don’t think that’s true,” said Agustin. “You see a lot of violence against workers already at the self-checkout kiosks when they even are attempting to [deter theft] … there’s a potential that this might hurt that [deterrence] … it also could provoke people.” 
Plus, “there’s already cameras in stores,” said Agustin. 

Bodycams from Motorola Solutions are in place at the docking station.
Klaus-Dietmar Gabbert | Picture Alliance | Getty Images

David Johnston, vice president of asset protection and retail operations for the National Retail Federation, the retail industry’s lobbying arm, provided a different perspective. He said the retailers he works with have said body cameras have helped to reduce conflict because people act differently when they know they’re being recorded, especially when those cameras are directly in front of a person. 
“Many of these body-worn cameras have reverse view monitors on them so … there’s a little video screen that you actually see yourself on camera. That in itself can be a very big deterrent,” said Johnston. “The moment that you see yourself is probably [when] you’re going to change your behavior, and that’s what I think the use of a body-worn camera can do.” 
As customers complain about merchandise being locked up in cases, body cameras are another technique retailers are trying out as they look to deter theft and make stores safer, said Johnston. 
“Walmart’s got tremendous exposure,” said Mark Cohen, former CEO of Sears Canada and former director of retail studies at Columbia Business School. “Walmart’s probably got a sales force that is very unhappy about what they’re exposed to … [and] feel like the store is not doing enough to protect the store and themselves. And this is a test to see whether it has any beneficial effects, both on deterring criminals and salving the anxiety and the irritation of their associates.”
Still, it’s not clear whether associates will feel better wearing body cameras. One longtime retail employee, who spent around a decade working at Hot Topic and has since left the industry, told CNBC that being threatened with violence was a regular part of the job, and they’re not sure body cameras would have stopped it.
“With these people, when they’re in our faces and they’re acting like they’re going to hit us or they’re making threats to meet us in the parking lot, they’re not thinking rationally,” said the former mall employee, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “Even with a camera facing them, I don’t think they would care in the moment.”
The former employee said a body camera wouldn’t have made them feel safer in those interactions, either, but having a police presence nearby would have helped.
Last year, the NRF’s annual security survey found that 35% of retailers who responded said they were researching body cameras for retail employees or loss prevention staff. While no respondents said body cameras were fully operational, 11% said the retailers were either piloting or testing the solution. 
TJX Companies is one of them. 
Earlier this year, the off-price giant said it had started using body cameras in its stores, which include its TJ Maxx, Marshall’s and HomeGoods banners. On a call with analysts after the company reported fiscal first-quarter earnings in May, finance chief John Joseph Klinger said the devices had been effective in reducing shrink, or lost inventory.
“One of the things that we’ve added — we started to do last year, late towards the year, wear body cameras on our [loss prevention] associates,” said Klinger. “And when somebody comes in, it’s sort of — it’s almost like a deescalation where people are less likely to do something when they’re being videotaped. So we definitely feel that that’s playing a role also.”
In a statement, a TJX spokesperson said the loss prevention associates who have body cameras have gone through “thorough training on how to use the cameras effectively in their roles.”
“Video footage is only shared upon request by law enforcement or in response to a subpoena. Body cameras are just one of the many ways that we work to support a safe store environment. This includes a variety of policies, trainings, and procedures,” the spokesperson said. “We hope that these body cameras will help us de-escalate incidents, deter crime, and demonstrate to our Associates and customers that we take safety in our stores seriously.” More

The 3×3 women’s hoops league Unrivaled announced the close of its Series A funding round, raising an additional $28 million before its inaugural season.
Investors in the latest round of funding included NBA champion Giannis Antetokounmpo and 28-time Olympic medalist Michael Phelps.
The league has signed 36 top players and said it offers the highest average salaries across any women’s professional sports league.

Chicago Sky coach Teresa Weatherspoon calls out to players during the first half of the team’s WNBA basketball game against the New York Liberty, May 23, 2024, in New York.
Frank Franklin II | AP

Startup basketball league Unrivaled announced on Monday it’s closed a Series A funding round, raising an additional $28 million before its inaugural season.
“Our players haven’t even taken the court yet and the foundation we are building with our partners unites unparalleled expertise, strategic insight, and an incredible product,” Unrivaled President Alex Bazzell said in a press release. “Together, we’re setting the stage for Unrivaled for years to come.”

The 3×3 women’s hoops league already secured $7 million in a seed round announced in May, meaning the league has received $35 million in total funds in 2024. The latest round was led by the Berman family and also included NBA champion Giannis Antetokounmpo and 28-time Olympic medalist Michael Phelps, among others.
Unrivaled was co-founded in 2023 by WNBA stars Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier and advertises that the player-owned organization will give every Unrivaled player “equity and a vested interest in its success,” according to the press release.
The league has signed 36 top players and said it offers the highest average salaries across any women’s professional sports league.
While the Women’s National Basketball Association has seen exponential growth in the last few years, superstar rookies Caitlin Clark and Angel Reese received base salaries just over $70,000, compared with star rookies in the National Basketball Association who received millions their first year.
Unrivaled announced last week it had signed Under Armour as its official uniform partner. It’s also signed an exclusive, multiyear media rights deal with Warner Bros. Discovery to air its games on TNT and truTV, as well as streaming platform Max. WBD participated in the Series A funding round, the league said Monday.

The round also included private investor Marc Lasry, University of South Carolina women’s basketball head coach Dawn Staley, and USC guard JuJu Watkins. Previous investors include soccer phenom Alex Morgan and actor and investor Ashton Kutcher.
The inaugural season begins on January 17. More

GM CEO Mary Barra, with the ending of its Cruise robotaxi operations, made it clear that the automaker’s growth priorities have shifted amid a broader, industrywide retrench to preserve capital.
The driverless ride-hailing service was supposed to be the shining star of GM’s growth opportunities, leading to $50 billion in revenue by the end of this decade.
Instead, GM is ending the robotaxi business and folding Cruise’s operations and an undetermined number of its nearly 2,300 employees into the automaker.

A Cruise autonomous taxi in San Francisco, California, US, on Thursday Aug. 10, 2023.
David Paul Morris | Bloomberg | Getty Images

DETROIT — For years, General Motors CEO and Chair Mary Barra has promised a new future for the company, away from a stodgy metal-bending automaker into a tech-driven, forward-thinking company poised for growth.
Part of the plan was for GM’s innovation division to identify trillions — yes, trillions — of dollars in new market opportunities such as electric commercial vehicles, auto insurance, military defense, autonomous vehicles and even, eventually, the potential for “flying cars,” also known as urban air mobility.

“We are creating world-class technology solutions and services that will change the way people move, along with new fleet solutions and entirely new business models,” Barra said during a virtual CES keynote in January 2022.
While GM has declined to disclose how much revenue such businesses have produced, Barra, with the ending of its Cruise robotaxi operations on Tuesday, made it clear that the automaker’s growth priorities have shifted amid a broader, industrywide retrench to preserve capital. Companies including GM are now focused on more “core” operations and adjacent business opportunities, including software, EVs and “personal autonomous vehicles.”
“You’ve got to really understand the cost of running a robotaxi fleet, which is fairly significant, and, again, not our core business,” Barra said during a Tuesday call with Wall Street analysts.
The driverless ride-hailing service was supposed to be the shining star of GM’s growth opportunities, with executives just a few years ago referring to it as an $8 trillion market opportunity that the automaker would lead. That included former executives touting $50 billion in revenue by the end of this decade, and Cruise being valued at more than $30 billion.
Instead, after spending more than $10 billion on Cruise since acquiring it in 2016, GM is ending the robotaxi business and folding Cruise’s operations and an undetermined number of its nearly 2,300 employees into the automaker.

Saving capital

As part of the wind down, GM is expected to disclose additional expenses from employee separation packages and repurchasing equity investments from outside investors, among other costs, in the next year.
GM cited the increasingly competitive robotaxi market, capital allocation priorities, and the considerable time and resources necessary to grow the business as reasons for its decision.
The automaker’s main competitor was Alphabet-backed Waymo, which is now the last entity with any notable public operations. Others, most notably Tesla, have ambitions for robotaxi businesses, but have failed to commercialize those operations thus far.
To GM’s credit, Wall Street, which previously pushed for such growth businesses, applauded the decision to end Cruise’s robotaxi ambitions. Shares of the company were initially higher, before ending the week level with when the announcement was made.

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GM stock since Dec. 9, 2024

GM, like other companies, has quickly shifted from trying to impress Wall Street with growth initiatives, including generating $280 billion in new businesses by 2030, to refocusing efforts on its core business to generate profits amid economic and recessionary concerns.
Analysts largely viewed GM’s decision as positive, saving the automaker more than $1 billion in capital annually, which they expect could be used for additional share buybacks, including a target to lower its outstanding shares to under 1 billion.
“It has been apparent for some time now that most investors have removed Cruise from their GM valuations, so today’s news comes as less of a surprise,” Wells Fargo analyst Colin Langan wrote in a Tuesday investor note.

Cruising no more

General Motors CEO Mary Barra speaks during a visit of the US president to the General Motors Factory ZERO electric vehicle assembly plant in Detroit, Michigan on November 17, 2021. 
Mandel Ngan | Afp | Getty Images

GM will combine the majority-owned Cruise LLC with GM technical teams. Barra repeatedly said last week that the automaker is not giving up on vehicle autonomy; it will focus on personal autonomous vehicles instead of robotaxis.
But it’s hard to ignore that Cruise is GM’s latest mobility venture or growth business to fold or not live up to expectations.
GM’s plans to diversify its business through fashionable industries such as ridesharing and other “mobility” ventures — a trendy term used previously by the industry for growth initiatives — or startups have largely fallen flat since the automaker started investing in such growth areas in 2016.
The automaker earlier this year folded its BrightDrop EV commercial vans into Chevrolet amid lackluster sales. It’s also failed to announce any meaningful plans for fuel cells for tie-ups with boats, trains and airplanes, and it’s shuttered several prior “mobility” businesses.
Not all of GM’s noncore businesses that were launched in recent years have failed. GM Energy and the BrightDrop commercial EV unit continue to operate under the automaker’s” Envolve” fleet business.
GM’s financial arm, meanwhile, continues to operate an insurance business that was launched in late 2020 as part of its growth initiatives with its OnStar telematics and data unit. GM on Friday said the operations are now in 12 states, and remain “well positioned for long-term success.”
GM also continues to operate a military defense unit and fuel cell business that have both recently announced new contracts or partnerships. That includes hundreds of millions of dollars in contracts for GM Defense.

Super Cruise

Other than saving capital, GM’s silver lining for canceling the Cruise robotaxi business was that it sees more promise in continuing to develop its Super Cruise hands-free advanced driver assistance system. That includes more semi-automated and, eventually, autonomous capabilities.
GM was the first automaker to offer such a hands-free system in 2016. However, it was an infamously slow ramp up until recently, when the automaker began rolling it out across its lineup. That started in 2021 and has continued to expand to more than 20 models, including high-volume vehicles such as its full-size pickup trucks and SUVs.

Interior of the 2025 Cadillac Optiq with GM’s Super Cruise hands-free driver-assistance system.

“The strategy shift demonstrates that GM continues to believe in the potential of AV technology for personal vehicles. Going forward, GM will focus on improving the capabilities of SuperCruise, which will be further enabled by ongoing technological advancements including in artificial intelligence (AI),” BofA Securities’ John Murphy said in a Wednesday investor note.
On the other side of the coin, Murphy also points out that the move could imply that other companies such as Waymo and Tesla “have better tech and/or that the market may not be appealing for later entrants.”

First-mover advantage lost

GM wasn’t expected to be a “later entrant” in robotaxis. In fact, it was the first to offer such rides to the public, and many believed it was one of the leaders until last year, when the company grounded its driverless operations in October 2023 following a crash involving a pedestrian in San Francisco.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration fined Cruise $1.5 million after the company failed to disclose details of the crash, which included a pedestrian being dragged 20 feet by a Cruise robotaxi after being struck by a separate vehicle.
A third-party probe into the incident ordered by GM and Cruise found that culture issues, ineptitude and poor leadership fueled regulatory oversights that led to the accident. The probe also investigated allegations of a cover-up by Cruise leadership but found no evidence to support those claims.
The report outlines multiple instances in which then-CEO and co-founder Kyle Vogt, who resigned from the company in November 2023, made the final calls to withhold information, specifically regarding media.
Vogt was not enthusiastic about GM’s decision to kill the robotaxi operations. He posted on X after the announcement, “In case it was unclear before, it is clear now: GM are a bunch of dummies.”
Vogt earlier this year pointed out GM’s history of having a first-mover advantage with technology, as it did with Cruise and Super Cruise, and squandering it. GM had a similar path with EV tech, like the EV1 — a battery-electric vehicle produced in the 1990s — and the Chevrolet Volt plug-in hybrid-electric vehicle in the 2010s, which were both abandoned by the company.

GM follows several other companies in abandoning robotaxis, including its closest crosstown rival Ford Motor, which shut down its Argo AI autonomous vehicle unit with Volkswagen in 2022.
The robotaxi leader in the U.S. remains Waymo, which continues to expand operations for its publicly available fleet in Los Angeles, Phoenix, and San Francisco, and will soon debut in Miami, Atlanta and Austin, Texas.
“In many ways this announcement highlights the economic challenges of scaling a robotaxi network and the role rideshare platforms can play as AVs attempt to commercialize (a bullish indicator), but we think the more tangible impact right now is on the partnership ecosystem given Waymo is already scaling despite the costs and Tesla has ambitions to do so as well,” Bernstein analyst Daniel Roeska said in an investor note last week. More

Travelers have shown airlines that they’re willing to pay more to get more room at the front of the cabin.
Meanwhile, frequent flyer members’ ranks are swelling, meaning there’s more competition for upgrades when seats are available.
Airlines are racing to add first-class or bigger international business classes with comforts such as lie-flat seats, entertainment systems with bigger screens and even suites with closing doors.

Passengers deplane through the business class seating area on an American Airlines flight, London Heathrow Airport, Aug. 14, 2018.
Jeff Greenberg | Universal Images Group | Getty Images

Cheap seats aren’t enough for airline passengers anymore.
Since the pandemic, travelers have shown airlines that they’re willing to pay up to sit at the relatively spacious front of the cabin. That means that many of the seats are already full, so it’s harder for frequent flyers to score free upgrades to the front of the airplane.

And the ranks of frequent flyers with elite status are swelling all the way from the airport lounge to the packed first boarding group, meaning more competition for those seats. Expect even more crowds during the year-end holiday period, which airlines predict will set another record.
Even in the off-season in early 2025, executives have been forecasting strong demand. U.S. airlines’ capacity in the first quarter will be up about 1% from a year earlier, according to aviation data firm Cirium.
“We’re seeing probably our best unit revenues on the transatlantic [routes], for example, in the dead of winter,” said Delta Air Lines President Glen Hauenstein at an investor day in November.
The price difference between first class and coach varies, of course, based on distance, demand, time of year and even time of day. For example, a round-trip ticket on United Airlines from its hub in Newark, New Jersey, to Los Angeles International Airport during the first week of February was $347 in standard economy and $1,791 in the carrier’s Polaris cabin, which features lie-flat seats, but not access to the international business-class lounge.
American Airlines’ nonstop flight from New York to Paris during Easter week 2025 was $1,104 in coach and $3,038 in the airline’s Flagship Business class.

A view from the Delta Sky Club at Los Angeles International Airport, Sept. 2, 2022.
AaronP | Bauer-Griffin | GC Images | Getty Images

Billions of dollars in revenue that keeps airlines afloat hangs in the balance. Airlines’ loyalty programs are a cash cow, and getting the balance right between perks such as free upgrades and bringing in cash is key.
In recent years, airlines have changed the requirements to earn status, rewarding spending and not just the distance flown. They’ve also raised the amount flyers need to spend to be anointed with elite status. Next year, customers will have to spend more on United to earn status. On Thursday, however, American said it would keep its requirements the same for the next earning year, which begins in March.

From giveaways to paying up

About 15 years ago, travelers were paying for seats in just 12% of Delta’s domestic first class. Now, that is closer to 75% and climbing, Hauenstein told investors last month.
“We gave them away based on a frequent flyer system,” Hauenstein said about first-class seats in 2010 and earlier. “The incentive was to spend as least as possible, fly as long as possible and get upgraded as often as possible. That led to a position where our most valued products were the biggest loss leaders.”
That’s now reversed for Delta, he said, as more money is going to the front of the cabin. The carrier generates 43% of its revenue from main cabin economy tickets, down from a 60% share in 2010.
The trend is cutting across the industry, from Delta, the most profitable carrier, to discounters such as Frontier Airlines, which is adding roomier first-class seats to the front of its Airbus fleet in 2025. On Wednesday, JetBlue Airways said it would introduce two or three rows of domestic business class on planes that don’t have its highest tier Mint business class with lie-flat seats, dubbing it “junior Mint.”
A day earlier Alaska Airlines announced it would retrofit some of its planes with premium seats as it readies new international flights after acquiring Hawaiian Airlines earlier this year, with revenue from higher price seats outpacing standard economy
“You see the Airbus 330s and the Boeing 787s are under-indexed in business class and lack an international premium economy cabin,” Andrew Harrison, Alaska’s commercial chief, said at an investor day in New York on Tuesday. “So we expect that beyond 2027, you will see our premium mix continue to grow.”

A Delta Sky Club passenger lounge inside the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Sept. 5, 2019.
Jeff Greenberg | Universal Images Group | Getty Images

Bigger business

Airlines are now racing to add first-class sections or bigger international business classes featuring bigger screens and closing doors to the flatbed seats.
“We’ve seen more paid demand for premium cabin than we ever did pre-pandemic,” said Scott Chandler, vice president of revenue management at American Airlines. “More people want the experience of the premium cabin.”
Chandler said American has worked over the past few years to make it easier for customers to buy up to pricier cabins, with post-purchase options to upgrade to first class or other cabins such as premium economy.

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American is retrofitting some of its longer range aircraft to include more premium seating, like other carriers, ditch first class entirely on some to add larger international business class cabins that will have new seats with sliding doors. Delta and United have also increased their premium offerings to keep up with customers who want to pay for the pricier seats.
“They are doing everything they possibly can to entice you to pay for their premium products. That’s absolutely what they should do,” said Henry Harteveldt, founder of travel consulting firm Atmosphere Research Group. Customers don’t buy a store-brand item at a department store and then expect “the sales person [to] ring up that product and hand you a designer bag for free.”
Southwest Airlines has taken its own approach. In 2026, it plans fly with several rows of extra-legroom seats, retrofitting its standard coach-only cabins that it has flown for more than half a century and doing away with open seating.
CEO Bob Jordan said it’s partly a “generational shift.”
“What we’re seeing is our younger customers seeking a little more premium,” he said in an interview this week. “A lot of this a mentality shift, the willingness to spend more on travel and less on other things.
But the airline decided to keep the number of seats on its aircraft largely similar and isn’t adding a first class like other carriers, after surveying customers and weighing the cost of losing space for more seats on board.
For first class, Jordan said, “You’re talking ovens, you’re talking meals, you’re talking provisioning. It’s a huge capital investment and a big leap.”
“But never say never,” he said. More