Starbucks baristas shut down the store at LaPorte Avenue and Silhavy Road in Valparaiso at noon on Christmas Eve in an attempt to bring the coffee behemoth to recognize the only unionized store in Valparaiso. It was one of 500 stores staging walkouts nationwide. A seasonal decal on the window of the coffee shop read “Old friends and new traditions.” For the striking baristas, it was a case of new friends and old traditions as union members of several other unions joined them in solidarity on the sidewalk fronting Lincolnway. Steelworkers Local 12775 representing NIPSCO employees, the NIPSCO Clerical Union, and the Indiana State Teachers Association were all in attendance chanting “No contract, no coffee” and “Understaffed and lousy pay, that’s the way your coffee’s made.” Vern Beck, vice president of Steelworkers Local 12775, which represents NIPSCO employees, said he and several other members of his union were out in the cold “because we get help from other unions when we strike so we always try to go out and help.” He recalled people from other unions coming out for a strike in 1980, as well as a march in 1997 from the old Radisson Theater to NIPSCO headquarters.