Amie here. An Iowa TikTok creator thought she was calling attention to a specific problem in Des Moines.

She had no idea the problems at this coffee chain were so widespread—until hundreds of messages began pouring in.

“The number of people I’ve had crying in my DMs and on the phone,” Madelyn Houser Webb told me, “because they’ve just never had anybody tell them that this isn’t okay.”

Watch the latest edition of Clocked In on:

A sample of the hundreds of comments and messages Madelyn Houser Webb received since posting a video about conditions at her local 7 Brew. (Screenshot of Iowa Starting Line video)

Houser Webb is a Central Iowa creator who posts family and lifestyle content to TikTok under @houserwebbfamily. She has over 140,000 followers and millions of video views.

Last fall, she and her family started going to 7 Brew, a coffee stand near their home. They liked it and got to know the workers well.

But one frigid winter day, when temperatures dropped into the negative double digits with the windchill, Houser Webb noticed several young workers standing outside with no protection from the cold.

She worried about their safety.

“As we were driving up, I’m like, ‘Wait, why are they outside? Are they gonna be outside all winter?’” she recalled thinking. “And then the person who brought the drink, my husband was like, ‘Are you guys getting heaters?‘

“And no one really had an answer.”

Thinking the Arkansas-based company might not be used to an Iowa winter, Houser Webb posted a video and tagged 7 Brew.

“I just wanted someone to say like, ‘Hey, yeah, we’re gonna get them heaters,’” Houser Webb said.

Instead, comments and private messages from 7 Brew workers across the country started pouring in. Workers told her they had little or no protection from the weather, whether it was too cold, too hot, or storming. And they said that wasn’t the only issue facing the mostly teenage staff.

Houser Webb was stunned.

“This isn’t just a one-stand issue,” she said. “Now, I’m looking at all these messages coming in. And the stories are horrific, to say the least.”

One woman who worked at a 7 Brew in the Des Moines metro, who asked to be anonymous to avoid retaliation for talking to press, told me outdoor employees at her store—known as “texters”—were required to stay outside their entire shift regardless of conditions, with no water or bathroom breaks. (Workers in other states told Houser Webb the company is supposed to have a policy about switching out workers in inclement weather.)

The worker also said the store hired mostly young workers in their first jobs, who were less likely to speak up about, or even recognize, bad working conditions. (A message seeking comment sent through 7 Brew’s contact form was not returned by the time this published.)

Houser Webb said, to the company’s credit, they installed heaters in toll-booth-sized “huts” for texters at her local store soon after her video went viral.

“I felt like, I’m so glad that you did that for these people. But now I have, at that point, 500 people across the country who are experiencing the same thing,” she said. “And you’re not sending heaters to them, and you’re not sending toll booths to them.”

Houser Webb says 7 Brew leaders have stopped talking with her, and workers have told her they’ve been forbidden from commenting on her videos. But she said she won’t stop advocating for them.

“Nobody deserves, for $8 to $10 an hour, to get frostbite for standing outside for four hours. Nobody deserves to have sunburn so bad that they can’t even put their clothes on,” she said, referencing messages from workers she’s gotten. “It’s a dangerous environment and, to me, it’s not necessary.”

Do you work at 7 Brew? Reply and tell me your experience.

Amie Rivers

Newsletter Editor, Iowa Starting Line

Member, COURIER United (WGA East)

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