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Tag: Bikini barista

  • Bikini Barista Describes Terrifying Kidnap Attempt

    Bikini Barista Describes Terrifying Kidnap Attempt

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    • Insider spoke to a drive-thru barista who was almost abducted from work on Monday.
    • Security footage shows a driver wielding a zip tie and grabbing her arm through the service window.
    • Baristas like her, who work in bikinis and lingerie, take extensive safety measures, she said.

    This article originally appeared on Business Insider.


    Auburn Police Department/Insider

    Security footage stills, collaged by Insider, showing the alleged kidnapping attempt on January 16, 2023 in Auburn, Washington

    A bikini barista described the moment that a zip tie-wielding customer tried to grab her through the service window of the drive-thru coffee bar where she works.

    The barista told Insider that the apparent kidnap attempt at Beankini Espresso in Auburn, Washington, was a “random act” and that she hoped the man would be brought to justice.

    Beankini Espresso is a female-owned coffee drive-thru whose baristas serve in lingerie and bikinis. The barista, who did not give her name, wrote to Insider through one of the company’s social-media accounts.

    Security footage shared by Auburn Police Department on Tuesday shows the brief but alarming encounter, in which a tattooed pickup driver makes an audacious lunge at the server.

    According to the barista, the driver ordered a drink at the window and paid. Then he asked for change for a $5 bill — and when the barista handed him the five $1s, “he grabbed me,” she said.

    The footage shows the moment: Seeming to reach out for the bills, the driver instead yanks at her bare arm, holding a slim black object described by Auburn PD as a zip tie. The man’s arm shows a distinctive tattoo that appears to read: “Chevrolet.”

    After a brief struggle where he seems to attempt to use the zip tie, he gives up and drives off. Auburn Police said on Tuesday that they had arrested a suspect at his home in the city after an “overwhelming” public response to the footage.

    Speaking to Insider on Wednesday, the barista said that she hopes that the would-be kidnapper is caught so that he can’t do this to anyone else.

    “There is nothing more we should have done or could have done to prevent this,” the barista told Insider, emphasizing the bar’s extensive safety precautions.

    The business owner “puts our safety number one, always has,” said the barista, who said she had worked there for several years.

    “We have mace, tasers, silent panic buttons, we have metal doors — extra precautions for if someone were to try to kick a door in,” she said. “We have audio, video.”

    If they get a problem customer, baristas are allowed to refuse service for any reason, she said.

    “Our owner allows us to shut the window on any customer and handle every situation in the way we feel comfortable,” she said.

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    Mia Jankowicz

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  • Seattle Judge to City: Bikini Baristas Can Wear Bikinis at Work

    Seattle Judge to City: Bikini Baristas Can Wear Bikinis at Work

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    A city rule prohibiting service workers from wearing bikinis is gender-based discrimination, according to a newly signed ruling by a U.S. district judge of Seattle, The Everett Herald reported.

    The initial legal complaint was filed by Jovanna Edge and some (now former) employees of Hillbilly Espresso, a chain of coffee stands served by women in bikinis or lingerie in Snohomish County, Washington.

    Edge, the coffee chain’s owner, told Entrepreneur that the scantier outfits are a way for the business to “stand out,” and that she felt motivated to take on the suit by what she sees as her constitutional rights.

    The ordinance in question said that service workers at establishments including “coffee stands, fast food restaurants, delis, food trucks, and coffee shops,” have to wear clothes that cover “minimum body areas.”

    The ruling found that the ordinance was focused on clothes “typically worn by women rather than men,” and thus constituted gender-based discrimination prohibited under the 14th amendment’s equal protection clauses.

    The legal battle goes back to 2009, the outlet reported. At that time, police said they getting complaints about the coffee stand and began giving out citations for things like indecent exposure. (Edge claims the complaints were not solely due to her business but another, similar business that was a “bad actor.”)

    Then, in 2017, Everett City Council issued the ordinance, per Fox 13, related to service workers and covering up – specifically, three inches below the buttocks, for example.

    “The city clerk is authorized to issue regulations to ensure full compliance and provide diagrams to illustrate the dress requirement,” the ordinance, which is still available on the city’s website, says. Local police had said dealing with complaints about the baristas was taking up time and energy, Fox 13 noted.

    A federal judge in 2017 blocked it from being enforced. Then, in 2019, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals vacated the injunction.

    In 2020, Edge and the other plaintiffs appealed their case to the Supreme Court — which did not take the case, and it ended up in the Western Washington district court, the Everett noted.

    The ruling said it was hard to conceive how it could be enforced equally for men and women and said that the rule counts as a violation of the Equal Protection rules in the 14th Amendment.

    The rule, “‘encourage[s] a humiliating, intrusive, and demoralizing search on women, disempowering them and stripping them of their freedom,’” the ruling said.

    Lawyers for the baristas have said that the attire is “empowerment.”

    “It is the embodiment of the belief that women must dress a certain way to avoid exciting men to sexual misconduct,” their team has written in legal documents. “Those beliefs are rooted in impermissible stereotypes about what is and is not proper dress and behavior for one’s sex.”

    The ruling, however, set aside claims that the baristas had made about free speech. The court also issued a partial summary judgment. This means that the ruling was made against one party – in his case, the city – with no need for a trial, the outlet noted.

    Edge said 80-85% of her employees are parents. The city was, “targeting young moms who are just looking to make their way,” she said. Now, they get to keep going to work, she added.

    The city did not respond to Entrepreneur’s request for comment.

    There are a number of bikini barista operations in the western US, including Bikini Beans Coffee in Arizona, and Lady Bug Bikini Espresso in Washington.

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    Gabrielle Bienasz

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