Starbucks’ newly named CEO and chairman Brian Niccol has come under fire over reports he will commute nearly 1,000 miles on a private jet from his home in Newport Beach, Calif. to the company’s headquarters in Seattle, Wash.
Niccol, who has served as CEO of the fast-food chain Chipotle since 2018, was announced as the coffee giant’s new boss earlier this month. He is replacing Laxman Narasimhan, who led the Seattle-based company for just over a year.
According to his job offer, Niccol will receive a base annual salary of $1.6 million and have a “small remote office” in his hometown of Newport Beach, which will be “maintained at the expense of the company.”
Niccol will not be required to relocate to the company’s headquarters. However, according to the document, he has agreed ”to commute from [his] residence to the company’s headquarters … as is required to perform your duties and responsibilities.”
The 50-year-old businessman, who will take up his new role September 9, will also be eligible to use the company’s aircraft for “business-related travel,” for “travel between [his] city of residence and the company’s headquarters” and for his personal travel needs, “in accordance with the company’s policies, up to a maximum amount of $250,000 per year.”
The announcement has outraged environmental rights advocates, who slammed Starbucks’ decision to offer a private-jet commute as “unjustifiable.”
“Private jets produce between five to 14 times more CO2 emissions per passenger kilometer than commercial flights, and up to 50 times more than trains, propelling us further into climate catastrophe,” Clara Thompson, lead campaigner for Greenpeace’s People over Greed campaign, told the Daily News.
Company jets are stark symbols of “social and climate injustice, where a privileged few indulge in the most environmentally damaging form of travel for mere convenience,” Thompson said. “At Greenpeace, we demand an immediate ban on private jets and call on governments and corporations to cease supporting and using this unequal and highly polluting mode of transport and turn to sustainable alternatives.”
Some social media users also criticized the news as “corporate hypocrisy at its best,” saying the company offers paper straws in some markets to reduce its environmental footprint.
“Starbucks CEO has decided to travel on a private jet for work instead of relocating,” one person wrote on X. “Meanwhile, we are supposed to save the environment and have our coffee with a paper straw that gets soggy in minutes.”
In late 2020, Starbucks formalized its “environmental goals to cut its carbon, water, and waste footprints by half” by 2030.
The company didn’t immediately return a request for comment Thursday morning.
