Are Starbucks and Whole Foods Union Busters?

[Omaha Steve]

http://bx.businessweek.com/whole-foods-market/view?url=http%3A%2F%2Fc.moreover.com%2Fclick%2Fhere.pl%3Fr2113769443%26f%3D9791



— Photo used under a Creative Commons license by flickr user Tortuga One.

Shortly before the inauguration of President Barack Obama, the manager of a Whole Foods grocery store in the San Francisco Bay Area gathered his employees in a conference room for a chat about labor organizing. “This is not a union-bashing thing whatsoever,” the manager began, adding, however, that he’d called the meeting because Whole Foods believed Obama would sign the Employee Free Choice Act, legislation intended to ease unionization that was opposed by the company’s lobbyists. According to a tape of the meeting obtained by Mother Jones, the manager went on to imply that joining a union would lead to reprisals: “It’s interesting to note that once you become represented by the union,” he said, “basically everything, every benefit you have, is kind of thrown out the window, and you renegotiate a contract.”

"I think it’s probably fair to construe as a threat,” concluded Tim Peck, a representative of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in San Francisco, after Mother Jones read him quotes from the meeting, one of several anti-union trainings held by the company in recent months. Peck pointed out that labor law bars employers from threatening to strip benefits from workers in retaliation for unionizing. “The ‘flying out the window’ kind of suggests that the benefits are gone,” he noted. Legally, “that wouldn’t pass muster.”

That Whole Foods stands accused of union busting comes at an inconvenient time for the company, which late last month unveiled the Committee for a Level Playing Field for Union Elections, a partnership with Starbucks and Costco that aims to rewrite the Employee Free Choice Act. This year’s top priority for organized labor, EFCA would allow employees to form a union automatically if a majority of them sign pledge cards—a plan known as “card check”—instead of requiring them to vote in secret elections that unions say employers can manipulate. Whole Foods opposes card check, yet has rankled business interests by suggesting other ways to make it easier for workers to unionize, such as guaranteeing union campaigners access to workers and boosting enforcement and penalties for labor law violations. “This is a third way,” says Whole Foods’ attorney Lanny Davis, a former special counsel to President Bill Clinton and self-described “pro-labor, liberal Democrat.”

Unlike Costco, where 20 percent of workers are represented by the Teamsters, Whole Foods and Starbucks stores haven’t been organized by traditional unions. And yet their cultures are steeped in the language and norms of the labor movement. Starbucks calls its workers “partners” and Whole Foods dubs them “team members.” A “Business Conduct Helpline” allows Starbucks baristas to a report workplace issues anonymously, and special committees of Whole Foods workers and managers resolve disputes. Both companies offer employees relatively generous wages and health benefits and routinely make Fortune’s list of “Best Companies to Work For.”

The firms’ granola reputations could give Democrats political cover to support a compromise on EFCA, averting a likely Republican filibuster. Yet the stores’ unique, do-gooder mentality paradoxically has left little space for actual unions. In 1997, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz wrote that he wanted workers “to believe in their hearts that management trusted them and treated them with respect...If they had faith in me and my motives, they wouldn’t need a union.” Whole Foods’ avowedly libertarian CEO, John Mackey, has compared the prospect of having unions at his stores to “having herpes.” An internal Whole Foods document listing “six strategic goals for Whole Foods Market to achieve by 2013,” obtained by Mother Jones, includes a goal to remain “100% union-free.”

Meeting that goal could be especially tough for Whole Foods and Starbucks if the economic downturn begins to reverse a decades-long decline in labor organizing. Consumers’ move toward cheaper food and drink is pressuring the chains to cut wages and hours. Starbucks baristas from the East Coast and Midwest have held raucous labor protests; cuts in shifts at some Whole Foods stores have prompted employees at one Bay Area location to seriously discuss unionizing.

FULL 2 page story includes starbucks info.

[leftstreet]

1. The Orwellian terms these people come up with!

"Committee for a Level Playing Field..."

[Yunomi]

2. Yeah. When I was a 'team member'

at Food Hole, (in 1996) I made $5.25 an hour. After 6 months, $5.50. And it stayed that way. For a year. I was offered the chance to buy insurance and stock I couldn't afford, and got 20% off groceries. When I left after 18 months, I got $500 because I didn't buy insurance or stock. No one EVER mentioned unions. Not much has changed, from what I understand.

[anigbrowl]

4. Hmmm

I can't help noticing that if you'd taken ~$500 in stock from that period and held it until 2006, you'd have turned it into $5000. Obviously I don't know your situation, but having worked for about the same rate during that period I don't think the pay was so terrible.

[Yunomi]

7. Oh, I only got the $500 after I left,

and could no longer buy stock at employee price. Besides, I needed the money to buy, like, food and stuff. They use their "benefits package" to screw people, making them choose between food and insurance. My beef with them is they brag about how good they treat 'team members', and while it's no worse than most Texas employers, it's certainly not as fabulous as they claim. I worked at a c-store next, and got great insurance, bonuses, and almost twice as much hourly.

[anigbrowl]

8. Oh I see. I thought that amount had been deducted from your paycheck.

[stray cat]

3. Starbucks provides health insurance and tuition reimbursement - I think even to part time workers

How many here have their employers subsidize tuition?

[Omaha Steve]

5. IWW Starbucks Union Condemns Starbucks Doubling Health Insurance Costs

Most part timers are denied the 20 hour work week requirement to get ANY benefits. Just do a quick goggle.

http://www.iww.org/en/node/4788

IWW Starbucks Union Condemns Starbucks Doubling Health Insurance Costs

Submitted by intexile on Fri, 07/31/2009 - 3:39pm.

For Immediate Release:

IWW Starbucks Workers Union
Media Contacts:
Aaron Kocher - 612-220-6454
Liberte Locke - 917-693-7742

July 28, 2009

IWW Starbucks Union Condemns Starbucks Doubling Health Insurance Costs Health Coverage Cuts Come Amidst Soaring Profits

Starbucks, amid massive profits, announced on Monday that it will slash at employee health care benefits. The company announced that premiums for its most economical employee health care package will nearly double, along with across the board increases in out-of-pocket expenses. This slap in the face to workers comes just one week after the announcement of $256 million in profits for the quarter, far exceeding internal and Wall Street expectations.

These cuts are an insult to Starbucks workers, and the thousands of workers who have been laid off in the last year. The increased costs of health benefits will be a barrier to many workers thinking of enrolling, forcing them to make the hard decision between health care coverage and feeding their families.

We expect more from Starbucks as a leading Fortune 500 company that builds its brand image on its treatment of its "partners", what it calls employees. Starbucks has a responsibility to provide affordable, quality healthcare to its workers, who are responsible for its enormous profits. Instead, Starbucks continues to use health care benefits as a marketing tool, while actually covering a lower percentage of its workforce than the notoriously unethical Wal-Mart.

Starbucks has repeatedly shown that it cannot be trusted to compensate us fairly. We believe as workers we must organize together to hold Starbucks accountable, and give us the respect and dignity we deserve.

About the IWW Starbucks Workers Union:

The IWW Starbucks Workers Union is an organization of over 300 current and former employees at the world's largest coffee chain united for secure work hours, a living wage, and respect on the job. The union has members throughout the United States and Canada, fighting for positive change at the company and defending baristas treated unfairly by management.

[Hannah Bell]

6. yes.