Starbucks show the opposite of Christmas spirit by firing employee for ‘stealing’ a bear cup, now she’s exposing company secrets

The Starbucks bear cups have caused chaos across the country as people scramble to get their hands on the holiday item, however, despite the promotional cup being part of this year’s Christmas festivities, the company has opted to be a big Scrooge by allegedly firing an employee who “stole” one of the bear cups.

Léaa Palmer was a Starbucks employee, was being the key word in that sentence, as she would promptly be fired by the company for giving away the last bear cup to a father and son who didn’t have the money for it. In a short video Léaa shows herself working at Starbucks along with the caption, “She doesn’t know it yet but stealing that last bear cup was the biggest mistake of her life.”

In the video caption she explains further, writing, I didn’t steal from the register. “I didn’t curse at a customer. I got fired for giving away a glass bear cup.” Some commenters on TikTok disagreed however. They claimed that, despite her good intentions, she was still technically stealing. “They did the right thing,” wrote one viewer, however, if Léaa is telling the truth then it seems unnecessarily harsh to fire an employee over such a trivial matter.

Léaa claims that the woman behind the father and son in the queue called corporate which resulted in her being fired. But she wouldn’t be going down without a fight as she decided she would reveal a few company secrets.

Starbucks behind the scenes

The ex-Starbucks employee claims that things are much more chaotic than what is witnessed by the average customer. She says she’s even seen “customers cry over sold-out tumblers like it’s the end of the world.” As for the pastries, Léaa alleges that “Half of them come in frozen boxes.” She also calls out the supposed fake scarcity produced by Starbucks over products like the bear cup as well, claiming it’s all intentional to get people queuing up early in the morning.

Starbucks has seen numerous boycotts in the past couple of years so it makes sense that the company would perhaps want to drum up hype in such a way. However, much of what Léaa claims could be chalked up to her frustration over being fired so take it with a pinch of salt. 

But then again maybe Léaa has a right to be angry. If her story of being fired really is true then it seems a little heavy-handed, why couldn’t management have given a disciplinary rather than jumping straight to dismissal? It’s not exactly keeping with the Christmas spirit now is it? She maintains that she “did the right thing” regardless.