Free Coffee! PETA ‘Cows’ to Hijack Starbucks Customers in Surcharge War

For Immediate Release:
April 11, 2023

Contact:
Nicole Meyer 202-483-7382

As part of a national day of action targeting Starbucks for charging extra for animal-friendly, emissions-slashing vegan milks, PETA supporters wearing cow masks will gather outside the Empire State Building—home to the chain’s three-story restaurant, bar, and café—on Wednesday to intercept would-be customers with free RISE Brewing Co. oat milk lattes. The push for passersby to avoid the coffee chain comes after nearly 150,000 PETA supporters asked the company to end its vegan upcharge and after Starbucks admitted that nondairy milks are better for the planet.

When:    Wednesday, April 12, 12 noon

Where:    Outside the Starbucks Reserve at the Empire State Building, 350 Fifth Ave. (at the southwest corner of the intersection with 34^th Street), New York

“Starbucks is counting its beans when it should be counting the number of customers it will lose if it doesn’t end the vegan milk upcharge,” says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. “People who choose to drink responsibly for the sake of animals or their own health or because they know that dairy farming is fueling the climate catastrophe are angry with the company for placing profits above ethics.”

PETA has also held vegan coffee drink giveaways outside Starbucks locations in Boston, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, and numerous other cities.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to eat or abuse in any other way”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview.

For more information, please visit PETA.org, listen to The PETA Podcast, or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.