Highwire Coffee in Oakland, Calif., June 3, 2026.

For the past several months, Highwire Coffee Roasters, a local coffee chain with eight East Bay locations, has been in turmoil.

Its CEO, Jeff Weinstein, who had been with the company for about a year, left Highwire May 29, an internal email obtained by SFGATE shows, and the manager and supervisor at the Rockridge location abruptly quit, according to an Instagram post by the Highwire Workers Union, leaving the store stressed and short-staffed. Most notably, in early March, the company suddenly shut down one of its most high-profile locations in Montclair, which reopened on May 29, according to SFGATE reporters who visited the location. 

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Though Weinstein told employees that the company shut down the store because it didn’t have a manager, it happened to close the same day union members asked to receive a response to their concerns of “harassment, transphobia, favoritism, and retaliation,” the union posted March 3.

According to a timeline posted by the union, employees previously made a list of demands to the company, asking them to address serious complaints of discrimination and harassment that have allegedly been ignored. Union members asked for a response by 5 p.m. on March 2 — but executives shut down the........

© SFGate