Starbucks 'Making a Change' for New Parents

Good news for moms- and dads-to-be who work for Starbucks: The coffee giant is expanding its paid parental leave policy. Quartz reports that, starting in March, birth parents who put in an average of 20 hours a week will receive 100% of their paycheck for 18 weeks—or triple the six weeks of pay that was previously offered in combination with 12 weeks of unpaid leave. Non-birth parents, including those welcoming a child via their partner, a surrogacy, or adoption, will now get 12 weeks of paid leave.

"No other retailer offers a better parental leave benefit for new parents," Starbucks says in a release. "Our benefit was already the best in retail, but after hearing from some partners who shared the leave as new parents wasn't adequate, we reviewed the program and have decided we're making a change." Bloomberg notes that paid parental leave in the US is still rare, citing a recent Society for Human Resource Management survey that showed just 40% of employers in the nation offered the benefit this year, an increase of just a single percentage point over 2023. (More Starbucks stories.)