Starbucks has a new policy about who can use its cafes. CEO Howard Schultz has announced that anyone can enter a Starbucks in the USA without making a purchase. That means people can sit down or use the restrooms. Mr Schulz told all Starbucks staff to treat everyone in the cafe as a customer. He said: "Any person who enters our spaces, including...restrooms, regardless of whether they make a purchase, is considered a customer." People can use Starbucks to sit down, relax and use the Internet. The new policy is for more than 8,000 cafes in the United States.
The new policy will make it easier for cafe managers to do their job. There have been recent cases of managers asking customers to leave a cafe or telling them not to use the bathroom. In April, two black men were led out of a cafe in handcuffs for waiting for a friend to arrive before they ordered. A week later, another black man was told he could not use the bathroom. He posted a video online of a white man using the bathroom without buying anything. Mr Schultz said he didn't want to make Starbucks a public bathroom, but the new policy was "the right thing" to do.