Less than two weeks before the coffee giant is expected to close all its stores for nationwide racial bias training on May 29, Starbucks is facing backlash again after one of its employees in La Cañada, California, used a racial slur on a Latino customer's order.
According to Telemundo 52, when the patron, who has only been identified as "Pedro" submitted his order at the store on Tuesday, rather than writing his name, an employee opted to write "beaner," a derogatory term often used to refer to a person of Mexican descent.
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Speaking to Telemundo, Pedro said a Starbucks spokesperson had apologized for the incident and tried to remedy the situation by offering him a $50 gift card.
"I did not accept it because it's an insult to everyone, that they want to buy you with a $50 gift card," he told the Los Angeles TV station.
Starbucks customers who spoke to CBS Los Angeles on Wednesday all found the employee to be in the wrong.
"I'm disappointed in Starbucks," one customer told the station. "I mean, that's — when you put something in the computer and put a name on something, you're labeling someone, and I think that's not right."
Another said that the incident "brings back a lot of discrimination. It brings back a lot of old, you know, growth that we should've had before."
Telemundo reported that the barista responsible for the slur was in their 20s. It's unclear what actions Starbucks will take to reprimand the employee.
Following the incident, Starbucks released a statement saying that "this is not indicative of the type of experience we want our customers to have when they walk into our stores."
"We have apologized to the customer directly and are working to make things right," it added.
The incident comes weeks after two black men were arrested in Philadelphia for trespassing after the store's white manager called the police because the men were sitting at the establishment without having purchased food or a drink.
