September 15, 2023 • 34 mins
Mia talks with Tylor Fellini and Alex Gage, two organizers involved with the New Seasons Labor Union about the incredible success of their union and the wave of large independent unions sweeping across Portland.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
It's it's another union episode of VI could happen here
in the podcast where we do a lot of things,
but one of which is talking about unions, one of
which is not doing great intros. It's me and Mia
Wong and today I'm here to talk about a union
and a strike and a bunch of other stuff. And
with me to talk about this is Tyler Fellini, who
(00:26):
is an organizer with Portland Childs with Justice and also
a former New Seasons worker. And Alex Gage, who's an
organizer in store rep for the New Season's labor union
shop in our Berlage.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Both YouTube, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Yeah, thanks for having us, happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Yeah, I'm glad, glad to talk with you too. So
I guess before we get into the sort of current stuff,
I wanted to talk a bit about how how the
certain New Seasons union was formed and you know what
that sort of process looked like and how it's been
going since then.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Yeah, I can speak to that.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
So, the initial unionizing efforts started at the store that
I was working at, Seven Corners, and we actually the
first conversation we had was April first, the same day
that Amazon labor union went public and won their electional
so it was like a really inspiring moment for us.
That spurred a conversation on the shop floor with a
(01:24):
couple coworkers, which quickly escalated to six of us meeting
in a nearby coworkers backyard. We talked about the issues,
and we were all hitting the same things, you know,
Like we were all upset with the tenants policy, the
way that New Seasons was treating us and had been
treating us during COVID.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
We were also upset with our pay.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Which is obstein and does not keep up with the
cost of living in Portland, organ which is a very
expensive city. So and we were also really upset with
the healthcare that we have offered and how it's kind
of deteriorated over the years, especially for New Seasons as
a company that has a lot of people who've been
there for years and so there were a lot of
people who've seen just the downward decline. So those early
(02:04):
meetings went really well. We talked to coworkers on the
floor discreetly, and everybody was resonating with what we were saying.
We made a lot of progress really fast, and then
we had a meeting at a local bar here in
Portland Workers Tap, which huge shout out of them. They
are an amazing space for a lot of burgeoning independent
(02:26):
unions to have some of their early meetings. So we
met there with more members at our store, the Seven
Corners location, and I think we had like thirty people there,
which is a huge turnout for a first showing of
a meeting.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
And then from there we moved pretty fast to getting
cards signed for showing of interest, and so in less
than two months we were actually filing our petition with
the NRB, which is unheard of.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Yeah, that's amazing, especially for a grocery store union. That
is wild.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
As soon as we went public, workers at all these
other stores reached out to us. Our Instagram blew up.
People were excited but wanted to figure out how to
do it at their store. So we were kind of
simultaneously trying to balance the plates of like keeping our
store going and also helping other stores go. And you know,
by the end of the summer we rolled into we
had our election, I want to say in September, and
(03:21):
by the end of the summer there were multiple stores
that had gone public and announced and here we are,
you know, it's barely been a year since our first
election win.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
It's barely been a year since.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Then, and we have over nine hundred members, almost one
thousand members in this very new union.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
That's incredible. That gets into another thing I'm interested about,
which is Portland's the city that has been in the
last I mean, I would say probably the last five years,
but especially in like the last couple of years, it's
been really really active in terms of in terms of
union organizing, in terms of sort of especially especially independent unions,
there's been an enormous number of them. The actual number
(03:59):
of workers be organized is really high. And yeah, I
mean you talked about having like having this bar as
a sort of space you could do meetings. Has there
been any other stuff, I mean from from other independent unions,
from other I mean, just from the fact that there's
so many like things happening that have like changed the
dynamics of how these union organization thrives have been going.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Yeah, so early on, you know, we were weighing our
options as far as like did we want to join
an existing union or go independent?
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Like what did we want to do there?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
And a lot of that information is hard to find
if you don't know the language that you're looking for.
Speaker 4 (04:37):
It's not really accessible to the average worker.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
But we found a lot of solidarity in folks who
had been involved in other independent union efforts. Specifically, we
met with Mark and Luis at a burgerbelt workers union.
They offered a top. Yeah, they're great. They were some
of the early folks to reach out and help us.
We were also able to talk to some of the
folks at ILW Local five that represents pals workers and
(05:01):
many others and get some support there.
Speaker 4 (05:05):
Portland is definitely.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
A labor town, uh, And the solidarity that we felt
kind of across the board is great, you know, especially
like early on when we had a lot of questions
and we didn't have any answers and we didn't have
many resources to you know, hire a lawyer and ask them.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
So I want I wanted to go back a little
bit to talk about sort of the influence of the
sort of influence of the news about the Amazon labor
(05:43):
union going wide and how that sort of worked. Have
you seen a sort of similar thing with other like
not just sort of not not just New Seasons shops,
but have you seen other shops that sort of like
decided to start organizing after y'all came out.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
I think think that there is a general energy among
the rank and file, right that some of the old
ways that unions are organizing, we're not the most representative
of the workers, which is in part you know, the eighties, right,
and so kind of why we've seen sort of union
representation stagnant. But we're seeing a major shift, right. We've
(06:21):
got a lot of educated workers doing low wage jobs,
which that condition existed in the nineteen thirties and led
to a major explosion in militant unions. So I think
there's a major parallel there. And it's not just Amazon
labor unions. Also, you know the Starbucks Workers United, that
campaign was huge, right, and those are workers who service workers,
restaurant workers historically have been left out of labor or underrepresented,
(06:45):
similar to healthcare workers and just care workers generally. And
that I think is kind of the stereotype of like
the working class as like a trad white guy in
a factory, and we're seeing that severely upended right now,
which is really exciting.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Yeah, but that's a that's a that's another dynamic I
think is really is really interesting, particularly in Portland is
that it seems to be a lot of independent unions.
And it seems to be I think partially because even
even in the midst of the fact that like very
clearly people want to organize, there's been a lot of
conservatism on the part of the sort of like larger
(07:20):
distant unions. You don't really want to like throw an
enormous amount of money into these organizing drives, which means,
you know, if if this stuff is going to happen,
it's it's it's the independent unions. And yeah, I don't know,
like I I think I think your point about sort
of I think your point about the sort of both
both the highly educated workers thing and the way that
(07:44):
you know, sort of what's constitutionally considered a worker and
what unions are willing to sort of throw money at
are tied together, because Yeah, I mean, you know, like
the shops that you're working in, the shops are getting
organized just aren't the kind of thing that anyone's been
organizing for like ever. It's very at least not since
like the eighties.
Speaker 5 (08:05):
Yeah, and I think it makes sense why they don't organize.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
It's freaking hard.
Speaker 5 (08:11):
It's a lot of work and there's a lot of turnover,
and you don't see those same faces. That's why we
can get from having our first meeting to filing for
election in two months, because if it doesn't happen in
two months, it's never going to happen.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
And we get it done, we get it done fast,
and then.
Speaker 5 (08:31):
We see all these other like as a grocery store,
we get DELIVERI it's from bigger union, you know, drivers
and such. And we've seen what's happened with their campaigns
where if they're not like totally invested, they can get
decertified within a matter of weeks.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
But we haven't had any of that yet.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Yeah, which is really impressive. And you know, that's another
thing I'm interested and I've been asking a lot of
people because turnover is one of the big things that's
been sort of you know, it's it's been the wall
that the existing units hit and we're like, this is
too hard, We're going to go do something else. And
I've been I'm wondering how y'all have been dealing with
the turnover problem because it's i mean, it is definitely
(09:19):
something that's difficult to deal with, but you know, it's
it's it's not something that makes it impossible. It's just hard.
And I'm yeah, I'm interested in what your sort of
strategies to manage it have been.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
I think it's a matter of passion.
Speaker 5 (09:34):
I think Tyler is a great example, like is no
longer a member, but sees this as like the way
that we can move our society forward in general, Like
the labor struggle is the struggle, Like there's no war
black class war. If we don't do this, what are
we doing here? So wait, we stick around and we're
(09:58):
doing this for free. We're not getting paid for it.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
We're doing it because it's the right thing to do.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
When our lodge in Grant Park had their walkouts on
Labor Day weekend, there was a customer at Grant Park
who called out to us that, you know, we should
just go open up our own workers co op. And
my response to him was that, you know, if we leave,
there's just another batch of workers that are going to
go through these conditions. Like the goal is not that,
Like I wanted to be great for me, like I
don't even work in new Seasons anymore. I wanted to
(10:25):
be great for my former co workers who are still there,
and for the people that I don't know who are
going to come behind them. And that's that's how you
get around the high turnover. Pieces like the passion and
dedication and the drive to make conditions better for the
people coming after you, which is really antagonistic to the
way capitalism wants us to be very individual like oriented, right,
(10:46):
like we just care about ourselves and our day to day.
But that's the really great thing with like the worker power,
right is that you know, collectively we are so much stronger.
Collectively we can actually stand up to the boss and win, right,
And and that means just reorienting how we think about
the world, right, Like, like this job sucks. How can
I make this job better? I can just quit and
go get a better job. But if I change this job,
(11:07):
then the people who are still here also get better
working conditions.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
Yeah, And I think that there's kind of there's a
there's a kind of flip side of that too, right,
which is that you know, even if you like, you know,
like turnover just is inevitable to some extent, even even
if you have people who like want to stay and fight,
right like, people are just going to have to leave.
But on the other hand, you know, if you're if
you're if you're in a unionized workplace, and if you're
pecifically if you're if you're if you're in a union
(11:33):
that has the sort of militant culture, what you're doing
is you're you know, you're changing the actual like class itself,
right because you know, like now now you're a worker
who like you know, I don't know, is moving to
Arizona or something. Right, they are, they are. They are
now also much more militant and have have this sort
of experience of organizing that they may that they may
not have had before. And this, you know, it's like
you're the any any any individual movement you're doing in
(11:57):
one place is building up the entire class.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
Yeah, and we can see that we've like been attracting
people who are interested and becoming involved in a movement.
And you know, whether they just graduated from college or
they had some sort of distant relative who was in
a union, they come to new seasons thinking, oh, I
(12:21):
want to get.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
In on the beginning of this.
Speaker 5 (12:24):
And we've seen like a big push of that recently,
and people who leave they want to go, you know,
organize their next workplace. You know, regardless if they were
fired or whatever. They they want to keep it going.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
So and I think to build on that too.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
You know, salting is a practice that traditional unions typically
do to kind of change a workforce. And when you salt,
usually you're paid by the union to go in there.
And so you're getting paid by the employer to be
there and the union is paying you to organize. But
we've seen a shift now where people are voluntarily salting. Right,
people come like out that they get a job. They
don't need the money motivator. They just want to function
(13:04):
up right, They want to change things and like be
antagonistic towards the boss. And I think to me to
go back to an earlier thing you asked about, like
kind of like why Portland, right, Like, I think one
thing about Portland is people in Portland love a protest, right, Like,
we don't need much of a motivation to go through.
Speaker 4 (13:18):
Some rocks at popped, right. That's kind of in the
culture of Portland.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
And so there is this this orientation towards struggle that
does exist. And right now, that energy, you know, we
went through the George Floyd uprising and a lot of
energy has been funneled into labor and it's been new
voices in labor. It's not the same like you know,
ten people now kind of talking. It's all of this
new energy. And for the most part, most of Portland
(13:45):
labor is being very accommodating and making room for those
people to get in there and be heard because folks
recognize that they're on their way out right, you know,
Folks in their fifties or sixties, like they're towards retirement, right,
And so it's as younger folks coming in that are
going to change it, you know.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Yeah, And I think there's an interesting dynamic with this too,
which is that, you know, okay, one of the one
of the sort of conditions of the last sort of
like forty fifty years of capitalism, Like is is this
sort of high total turnover rates? And also is this
you know, is this thing where you are, like you
as an individual worker are shifting jobs really really quickly,
(14:23):
and that you know, that's in some sense an issue.
But that also means that like I don't know, like
if if you have a bunch of people who you know,
spent like spent one hundred days fighting the Feds and
you know still still may like have have developed just
like the sort of miilited hatred of the cops. And
you know, I've developed sort of and into capitalist politics. Yeah,
(14:43):
you get more of the sort of salt stuff you're
talking about, because like you know, SCRIWT, Like, you know,
if you're gonna be working like a ship job anyways,
you might as well like go work one where you're
saulting and starting a union, because there's not actually like
I don't know, it's not it's not it's not like
you're like getting career advancement in the service job, right,
(15:04):
And yeah, I mean that seems to be driving like
at least some of the sort of of how this
kind of like how the independent United Union organizing in
Portland's been moving.
Speaker 4 (15:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (15:17):
I think I'd also like to point out though that
like a lot of people for our union, specifically, New
Seasons has always been like the progressive business and it's
always had a reputation of like being a great place
to work.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
They're really inclusive or whatever.
Speaker 5 (15:40):
So that's what attracts like a certain crowd of people.
And when they get there and they realize that, like
they're getting screwed over, just like any other place that
they've ever been at that like fosters this new feeling
of like, well, I'm vulnerable no matter what I do,
Like there's no where I can turn to trust my employer,
(16:05):
and how do I preserve what little.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Dignity that I do have at this workplace?
Speaker 5 (16:11):
Because generally speaking, like our jobs are pretty okay minus
like the corporate business side of things, Like most people
enjoy going to work, maybe, but.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
They they want to enjoy going to work.
Speaker 5 (16:29):
So having that like kind of double edged sword has
been a catalyst for us.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Just built on what Alex said too.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
I think it's really interesting that a lot of the
surge in new like independent union stuff has been you know,
new seasoned Starbucks to a degree, ARII creator Joe's all
these places, these progressive workplaces, right, And what's happened is
that so often we've had interactions with customers where they go, wow,
(16:59):
I assumed that the prices were so high because your
wages were high, And really, dude, most of us can't
afford to live in the city, right, most of us
are using yeah, and it's just not it's not true, right,
And so you know it's workers who get jobs at
these progressive places that drank the similar social kool aid
that the customer's drink of assuming that these businesses have
(17:20):
good business practices and what's happening is that they're just
getting greedy. Right, This is the case everywhere. It just
hits a little bit different when your employer pretends your
friends and then stabs you in the back.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
Yeah. Not all workplaces have this kind of like oh,
we're like progressive sort of vibes thing. But I feel
like businesses that have that reputation are also more just
more vulnerable. It's not just that like their workers like
realize how ypocritical it is. It means that they're It
means that they're more vulnerable to sort of like damage
to their reputation when people find out that, like oh
(17:50):
my god, hold time, you're making how much money? Like yeah,
and I think, yeah, I don't know, I'm interested, like
how how effective has that been for you? Sort of
like leveraging that.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
I think it's been really effective, I mean, you know,
and not just does. I think a really good example
of exactly what we're talking about, right, is the shareholders
of Starbucks are holding Howard Schultz accountable because he is
wrecking that company. Right, and so with new seasons what
it means is that they play a very sneaky game.
They fight us in the back room. They make sure
it's not public facing. Anything we can do to attack
(18:23):
their public image, like it hurts. I will say too
that you know, we're kind of standing on the shoulders
of Burgerville Workers Union here where Burgerville was built on
this reputation of like local friendly, like we're the alternative
to like corporate fast food, and they had security guards
and strike busters literally fighting with picketers in the past
(18:44):
and it tanked the reputation. And so New Seasons management
has clearly looked at what Burgerville management did and been like,
we're not going to do that. It doesn't stop them
from being phitty. They're just they're more polite when they're
streitty to us. They're still just as shitty. They're just
they smile while they stab us in the back.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Yeah, So on the subject just of stabbing us in
the back. So there's been a bunch of stuff going
on recently. I was wondering if you could talk about
like the I don't know, the recent unrest. Question Mark
need to figure out a better way to phrase this, but.
Speaker 5 (19:23):
Yeah, yeah, so, yeah, we've been building up we have,
I mean since day one of bargaining, which started back
in like December or January.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
It started in January.
Speaker 5 (19:36):
Yeah, so we we've known that eventually it's going to
get to a point where we're going to need to.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
Show some force.
Speaker 5 (19:46):
So, you know, we go in there with good faith,
and little by little we find out that the smallest
ask is going to be impossible, and we find out
that they're going to do whatever they can get away
with every time they can. So they started with I mean,
(20:07):
they did all kinds of things, but the one catalyst
is they changed the attendance policy for non union workers
and non union stores to make it more lenient, which
was one of the issues that we campaigned on was
(20:27):
the attendance policy because it's ridiculous and people get fired
all the time. So we demanded the bargain. They didn't
have a response.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
We brought it up in bargaining at the bargaining table.
Speaker 5 (20:41):
They said that they would work on something that we
could implement before we ratify the contract.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
But they had to put it through their DEI lens
and they had to Yeah.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
Yeah, and you know all the things that say to
delay it and kick the can down the road. So
we're Dylan good faith saying like, okay, you know, go ahead.
Speaker 3 (21:10):
So then we did.
Speaker 5 (21:11):
A petition where all the stores individually had people sign
a petition. We got hundreds of signatures, and then we
did a march on the boss asking them to sign
this MoU that a memorandum of understanding saying you will
give us that same policy. We filed a ULP saying
(21:35):
like this is illegal, it's obvious discrimination, and then they
just kept saying, Okay, we're working on it, We're working
on it, We're working on it.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
So they never did.
Speaker 5 (21:47):
Then we did a rally and we showed up at
the headquarters with I don't know, probably two hundred of
us Hell yeah, and marched up to the office and
chanted and made a scene.
Speaker 3 (22:05):
And told them they have one more.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
Chance to sign the m OU. They didn't sign it.
So then we organized the strikes at the two stores and.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
Gave them one more chance to sign the MoU. They
didn't sign it. We already knew they weren't going to.
Speaker 5 (22:24):
So yeah, we shut down those stores for the rest
of the day at Grant Park and for one hour
at ourbor Lodge, and it was powerful.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
We had a lot of support a lot of people
showed up.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
Yeah, and to build on that too.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
You know, there's things coming up that we can't talk
about yet, but I would say that, Alex, do you
want to talk about the practice picketing?
Speaker 4 (22:54):
I feel like we could talk about that.
Speaker 5 (22:56):
Okay, so we actually can talk about We just filed
the ULP, yeah, last night for bad faith bargaining.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Yeahs an unfair labor practice.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
Yes, thank you. I get caught up in the jargon.
So we just.
Speaker 5 (23:10):
Filed that last night for bad faith bargaining yep, because
they gave us the most ridiculous policy for attendance. It's
basically regressive bargaining, which is totally unfair.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
Yeah, do you want to explain what that is?
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Basically, the NLRB the National Labor Relations Board. They oversee
unions and the relationship between unions and employers. They demand
that both sides come in good faith, basically like, don't
screw around, don't waste each other's time. The goal is
to move towards some sort of compromise and an agreement.
And regressive bargaining is when you backpedal and you offer
(23:52):
something that is worse than what was offered. The attendance
policy is in my opinion, definitely worse. It is no better.
I think Frank takes the shittiest things of the past
two policies and put them together. So it seems pretty
clear to us that it's regressive. And then we can
argue that New Seasons is not acting in good faith.
They are acting in bad faith, which is illegal according
(24:12):
to the NRB. And so what we are allowed to
do is file an unfair labor practice, which basically, you know,
it doesn't hold a lot of weight materially, however, symbolically
it looks really bad. And so again going back to
like Mia what you were saying about kind of like
their image, right, Like these kind of progressive corporations, they
don't want to look like the bastards they are, And
(24:35):
a UOP makes it pretty clear, Hey, this person's being
a jerk, this company is being a jerk. So the
more ulps that we get file that, like we win
on the bigger case, we can paint that New Seasons
is actually being really unfair to us.
Speaker 5 (24:47):
Yeah, so then based on that, we're getting strike ready.
We're making sure everybody can show up and be ready
to assert our stance. We're not going to just lay
back and let them take over. So we're going to
(25:11):
do some practice pickets. Oh and I'm sure even hearing
that a lot, which is great for I mean, and
if you want to bring it back to like the
higher turnover rate and like, you know, the general apathy
that you see in any union. People are just kind
(25:31):
of afraid to be active. So we're looking at practice
pickets as a way to get people.
Speaker 3 (25:38):
Involved in a really low risk activity.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
Can you explain how that works?
Speaker 5 (25:45):
Yeah, So what we're going to do is each store
will do a picket, but that picket will not be
a strike.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
That picket will not.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
Encourage shoppers to leave or discourage shopping in any way.
Speaker 3 (26:04):
We're not calling for a boycott.
Speaker 5 (26:05):
We're just simply doing logistically, what does it look like
if we do a picket at each store in the
most peaceful way possible, and then we do that at
every store and we kind of gauge, like, you know,
how ready are we.
Speaker 4 (26:24):
And by doing that too, it's a show of force
to the company.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Right, Yeah, we're not doing anything illegal.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
It's effectively an informational picket. So legally, there's nothing that
New Seasons can do to any of the workers who
participate in it. However, they will absolutely see that we
are prepared to do it. The team Staris recently did
this for ups. A lot of teachers unions have done
similar things. It's a really good show of force to
kind of leverage your people power and show the management
(26:50):
that you're ready.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Yeah, and it has another It has another effect too,
which is something that you know, the kind of basic
cultural understanding of you know, what unions are, how they function,
what you need to be doing any given scenario, like
me just physically, how to like do pickets, what you
logistically need to do. That stuff has all sort of
(27:12):
faded from like the height of union sort of culture
in like the sixties and seventies, And that's something that
you have to rebuild because you know, and and and
then and this is this is something that's both both
in terms of the people in the union. That sort
of knowledge is tuitional knowledge has to be rebuilt, and
it also has to be rebuilt in the public because
people sort of just don't you know, like you support
(27:34):
for unions is really high, uh, but people don't understand
exactly what like you know, people people don't understand exactly
what a union is doing any given time or like
how it functions and things like that, and you know,
then this is this seems like a really good way
to like, you know, like, hey, this is a picket.
This is what happens when there's a picket. This is
an informational picket. We're gonna give you information. And yes,
(27:57):
it seems like a good thing for building up that
kind of true on both ends.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
And it's a really good opportunity to talk to customers,
get them involved. That's the thing that's that you know
New Season's kind of tagline as the friendliest store in town,
and the way that they built that, Yeah, the way that
they built that reputation though, was by really encouraging workers
to develop deep relationships with customers. And so we're using
(28:22):
that to leverage against the company now and saying like hey,
like you.
Speaker 4 (28:25):
Know you like me, like you know me by name
and I know you by name. You don't know the
CEO by name, Like let's talk.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Let's talk about like what we're asking for and what
you as a customer can do to support us in
a way that doesn't feel antagonistic, right like like when
we had the when we had the walkouts on Labor Day, weekend.
Speaker 4 (28:43):
You know, we did a debrief and.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
We're kind of like, how do we, like, how do
we engage with people where we can hold onto our
values and still feel like we're being effective. And Randy,
a worker at our lodge, his solution, instead of calling
people who cross the picket line scabs and like you know,
harassing them that way, you know, he was like, I
just said, like, hey, I'm disappointed in you, and I
think that like, like, yeah, like let's just like we're
(29:05):
gonna just like if you're going to cross the picket line,
I don't need to hurl insults at you. I'm just
gonna guilt trip you and let you know that like
I'm disappointed in you, and like you will feel bad
as you're shopping. And I think that like that's sort
of how we can align the progressive values that attracted
people to New Seasons to work there in the first
place with how we do actions while still being militant, right,
we don't.
Speaker 4 (29:24):
Want to be soft. We just got to make sure
that like it vibes with what we're about, you know.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Yeah, And and that's that's another you know, I think
this this also gets back to the sort of culture
part of it, which is like, yeah, like rebuilding the
standard of do not cross a picket line is a
thing that has to be done because that's again that's
another thing that has sort of faded. And yeah, like
guilt tripping people is a good way to do it,
because yeah, you know, like sort of especially especially sort
(29:54):
of like middle and upper middle class progressive people like
really really there are a lot of their politics about
wanting to feel good about themselves and you.
Speaker 6 (30:03):
Know, make they can see Yeah, I think if they
can see themselves in us too, they will relate and
they they won't want to.
Speaker 3 (30:17):
Go against their own values, which is our.
Speaker 5 (30:21):
Values, because that's the culture of Portland generally speaking.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Did you have anything else that you want to make
sure to get in before we wrap up.
Speaker 5 (30:30):
Yeah, we would love to push our gofund me that
can be found at our website, which is really hard
to find is but yeah, you have to type it in,
you can't just google it.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Okay, Well we'll put it. We'll just we'll just put
a link to it in the okay, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (30:51):
Yeah, yeah, if anybody you know, we're out here being
independent union.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
We have no money.
Speaker 5 (30:58):
We're just looking for maybe some sort of strike fund
for those in need when we are strike ready, and
also you know, materials whatever people can donate, it would
be amazing.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Final notes I would say too, is that you know
when we started this, I mean, we're an independent union
of grocery workers, right.
Speaker 4 (31:20):
We did all of this in our volunteer time.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
None of us are lawyers, none of a lot of
us had never been in a union before or had
very limited experience. We build this all from the ground
up with tons of volunteer hours of our own time
after work. And we have gone toe to toe with
Ogle Tree Deacons, who is one of the largest anti
union law firms in the country. That's who New Seasons
(31:44):
has retained. We've gone toe to toe with them. We
have a lawyer now who is really graciously kind of
letting us write her.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
In IOU for the time being.
Speaker 2 (31:54):
But even before her we were still able to hold
her own against a major anti union law firm.
Speaker 5 (32:00):
Right.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
There is power in workers coming together collectively. It's not
as easy as it should be to find that information,
but it is out there and there are people who
want to share it. And I would say that, like
for me, the labor movement has been a really empowering
place to come into. You know, I have a lot
of experience with sort of like leftists, like street activism,
(32:22):
but I think that for anybody who wants to be
involved in the struggle and is also like looking for
ways to make.
Speaker 1 (32:29):
In rids and develop community like.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Labors where it's at right, I mean, we all work
and to a degree, we all hit our jobs and
have something to complain about, and like that's a commonality
that stretches across the aisle and allows for a lot
of solidarity in a way that the culture war really
doesn't want and really, like you know, it's by design, right,
the capitalists want us fighting against each other, and the
(32:53):
labor movement is a way for the working class to
unite because it's about class war.
Speaker 4 (32:57):
You know.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Yeah, here here, yeah, and you know this this should
go without saying. I'm going to say it anyways, you also,
listener at home can do this too. There is you know,
there there is nothing sort of magical or special about
the people who do union organizing other than the fact
that they decide to organize a union. So you can
(33:22):
do this too. You can form an independent union and yeah,
you can go hand your bosses a fucking ass and
get better, you know, get better working conditions and get
better things for you and your entire class in the process.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Yeah, I would say Labor Notes is a great resource
for early information. The Coalition of Independent Unions is on
Instagram and workers from around the country have reached out
to them for advice. You know, we're on Instagram. You
can ask us questions. Reach out to independent unions and
ask them questions. This is a labor movement made up
of the workers for the workers. We want more workers
(33:55):
to organize.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Yeah, and I think on that note, Yeah, this is
this is been naked happen here, Go into the world
and fight.
Speaker 3 (34:03):
Yeah, thank you, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Maya.
Speaker 3 (34:10):
It could Happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 5 (34:13):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool zonemedia dot com or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources.
Speaker 5 (34:27):
Thanks for listening.
It's it's another union episode of VI could happen here
in the podcast where we do a lot of things,
but one of which is talking about unions, one of
which is not doing great intros. It's me and Mia
Wong and today I'm here to talk about a union
and a strike and a bunch of other stuff. And
with me to talk about this is Tyler Fellini, who
(00:26):
is an organizer with Portland Childs with Justice and also
a former New Seasons worker. And Alex Gage, who's an
organizer in store rep for the New Season's labor union
shop in our Berlage.
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Both YouTube, Welcome to the show.
Speaker 3 (00:39):
Yeah, thanks for having us, happy to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Yeah, I'm glad, glad to talk with you too. So
I guess before we get into the sort of current stuff,
I wanted to talk a bit about how how the
certain New Seasons union was formed and you know what
that sort of process looked like and how it's been
going since then.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
Yeah, I can speak to that.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
So, the initial unionizing efforts started at the store that
I was working at, Seven Corners, and we actually the
first conversation we had was April first, the same day
that Amazon labor union went public and won their electional
so it was like a really inspiring moment for us.
That spurred a conversation on the shop floor with a
(01:24):
couple coworkers, which quickly escalated to six of us meeting
in a nearby coworkers backyard. We talked about the issues,
and we were all hitting the same things, you know,
Like we were all upset with the tenants policy, the
way that New Seasons was treating us and had been
treating us during COVID.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
We were also upset with our pay.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Which is obstein and does not keep up with the
cost of living in Portland, organ which is a very
expensive city. So and we were also really upset with
the healthcare that we have offered and how it's kind
of deteriorated over the years, especially for New Seasons as
a company that has a lot of people who've been
there for years and so there were a lot of
people who've seen just the downward decline. So those early
(02:04):
meetings went really well. We talked to coworkers on the
floor discreetly, and everybody was resonating with what we were saying.
We made a lot of progress really fast, and then
we had a meeting at a local bar here in
Portland Workers Tap, which huge shout out of them. They
are an amazing space for a lot of burgeoning independent
(02:26):
unions to have some of their early meetings. So we
met there with more members at our store, the Seven
Corners location, and I think we had like thirty people there,
which is a huge turnout for a first showing of
a meeting.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
And then from there we moved pretty fast to getting
cards signed for showing of interest, and so in less
than two months we were actually filing our petition with
the NRB, which is unheard of.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Yeah, that's amazing, especially for a grocery store union. That
is wild.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
As soon as we went public, workers at all these
other stores reached out to us. Our Instagram blew up.
People were excited but wanted to figure out how to
do it at their store. So we were kind of
simultaneously trying to balance the plates of like keeping our
store going and also helping other stores go. And you know,
by the end of the summer we rolled into we
had our election, I want to say in September, and
(03:21):
by the end of the summer there were multiple stores
that had gone public and announced and here we are,
you know, it's barely been a year since our first
election win.
Speaker 4 (03:30):
It's barely been a year since.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Then, and we have over nine hundred members, almost one
thousand members in this very new union.
Speaker 1 (03:36):
That's incredible. That gets into another thing I'm interested about,
which is Portland's the city that has been in the
last I mean, I would say probably the last five years,
but especially in like the last couple of years, it's
been really really active in terms of in terms of
union organizing, in terms of sort of especially especially independent unions,
there's been an enormous number of them. The actual number
(03:59):
of workers be organized is really high. And yeah, I
mean you talked about having like having this bar as
a sort of space you could do meetings. Has there
been any other stuff, I mean from from other independent unions,
from other I mean, just from the fact that there's
so many like things happening that have like changed the
dynamics of how these union organization thrives have been going.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Yeah, so early on, you know, we were weighing our
options as far as like did we want to join
an existing union or go independent?
Speaker 4 (04:30):
Like what did we want to do there?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
And a lot of that information is hard to find
if you don't know the language that you're looking for.
Speaker 4 (04:37):
It's not really accessible to the average worker.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
But we found a lot of solidarity in folks who
had been involved in other independent union efforts. Specifically, we
met with Mark and Luis at a burgerbelt workers union.
They offered a top. Yeah, they're great. They were some
of the early folks to reach out and help us.
We were also able to talk to some of the
folks at ILW Local five that represents pals workers and
(05:01):
many others and get some support there.
Speaker 4 (05:05):
Portland is definitely.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
A labor town, uh, And the solidarity that we felt
kind of across the board is great, you know, especially
like early on when we had a lot of questions
and we didn't have any answers and we didn't have
many resources to you know, hire a lawyer and ask them.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
So I want I wanted to go back a little
bit to talk about sort of the influence of the
sort of influence of the news about the Amazon labor
(05:43):
union going wide and how that sort of worked. Have
you seen a sort of similar thing with other like
not just sort of not not just New Seasons shops,
but have you seen other shops that sort of like
decided to start organizing after y'all came out.
Speaker 2 (05:59):
I think think that there is a general energy among
the rank and file, right that some of the old
ways that unions are organizing, we're not the most representative
of the workers, which is in part you know, the eighties, right,
and so kind of why we've seen sort of union
representation stagnant. But we're seeing a major shift, right. We've
(06:21):
got a lot of educated workers doing low wage jobs,
which that condition existed in the nineteen thirties and led
to a major explosion in militant unions. So I think
there's a major parallel there. And it's not just Amazon
labor unions. Also, you know the Starbucks Workers United, that
campaign was huge, right, and those are workers who service workers,
restaurant workers historically have been left out of labor or underrepresented,
(06:45):
similar to healthcare workers and just care workers generally. And
that I think is kind of the stereotype of like
the working class as like a trad white guy in
a factory, and we're seeing that severely upended right now,
which is really exciting.
Speaker 1 (07:00):
Yeah, but that's a that's a that's another dynamic I
think is really is really interesting, particularly in Portland is
that it seems to be a lot of independent unions.
And it seems to be I think partially because even
even in the midst of the fact that like very
clearly people want to organize, there's been a lot of
conservatism on the part of the sort of like larger
(07:20):
distant unions. You don't really want to like throw an
enormous amount of money into these organizing drives, which means,
you know, if if this stuff is going to happen,
it's it's it's the independent unions. And yeah, I don't know,
like I I think I think your point about sort
of I think your point about the sort of both
both the highly educated workers thing and the way that
(07:44):
you know, sort of what's constitutionally considered a worker and
what unions are willing to sort of throw money at
are tied together, because Yeah, I mean, you know, like
the shops that you're working in, the shops are getting
organized just aren't the kind of thing that anyone's been
organizing for like ever. It's very at least not since
like the eighties.
Speaker 5 (08:05):
Yeah, and I think it makes sense why they don't organize.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
It's freaking hard.
Speaker 5 (08:11):
It's a lot of work and there's a lot of turnover,
and you don't see those same faces. That's why we
can get from having our first meeting to filing for
election in two months, because if it doesn't happen in
two months, it's never going to happen.
Speaker 3 (08:28):
And we get it done, we get it done fast,
and then.
Speaker 5 (08:31):
We see all these other like as a grocery store,
we get DELIVERI it's from bigger union, you know, drivers
and such. And we've seen what's happened with their campaigns
where if they're not like totally invested, they can get
decertified within a matter of weeks.
Speaker 3 (08:53):
But we haven't had any of that yet.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
Yeah, which is really impressive. And you know, that's another
thing I'm interested and I've been asking a lot of
people because turnover is one of the big things that's
been sort of you know, it's it's been the wall
that the existing units hit and we're like, this is
too hard, We're going to go do something else. And
I've been I'm wondering how y'all have been dealing with
the turnover problem because it's i mean, it is definitely
(09:19):
something that's difficult to deal with, but you know, it's
it's it's not something that makes it impossible. It's just hard.
And I'm yeah, I'm interested in what your sort of
strategies to manage it have been.
Speaker 3 (09:33):
I think it's a matter of passion.
Speaker 5 (09:34):
I think Tyler is a great example, like is no
longer a member, but sees this as like the way
that we can move our society forward in general, Like
the labor struggle is the struggle, Like there's no war
black class war. If we don't do this, what are
we doing here? So wait, we stick around and we're
(09:58):
doing this for free. We're not getting paid for it.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
We're doing it because it's the right thing to do.
Speaker 2 (10:05):
When our lodge in Grant Park had their walkouts on
Labor Day weekend, there was a customer at Grant Park
who called out to us that, you know, we should
just go open up our own workers co op. And
my response to him was that, you know, if we leave,
there's just another batch of workers that are going to
go through these conditions. Like the goal is not that,
Like I wanted to be great for me, like I
don't even work in new Seasons anymore. I wanted to
(10:25):
be great for my former co workers who are still there,
and for the people that I don't know who are
going to come behind them. And that's that's how you
get around the high turnover. Pieces like the passion and
dedication and the drive to make conditions better for the
people coming after you, which is really antagonistic to the
way capitalism wants us to be very individual like oriented, right,
(10:46):
like we just care about ourselves and our day to day.
But that's the really great thing with like the worker power,
right is that you know, collectively we are so much stronger.
Collectively we can actually stand up to the boss and win, right,
And and that means just reorienting how we think about
the world, right, Like, like this job sucks. How can
I make this job better? I can just quit and
go get a better job. But if I change this job,
(11:07):
then the people who are still here also get better
working conditions.
Speaker 1 (11:12):
Yeah, And I think that there's kind of there's a
there's a kind of flip side of that too, right,
which is that you know, even if you like, you know,
like turnover just is inevitable to some extent, even even
if you have people who like want to stay and fight,
right like, people are just going to have to leave.
But on the other hand, you know, if you're if
you're if you're in a unionized workplace, and if you're
pecifically if you're if you're if you're in a union
(11:33):
that has the sort of militant culture, what you're doing
is you're you know, you're changing the actual like class itself,
right because you know, like now now you're a worker
who like you know, I don't know, is moving to
Arizona or something. Right, they are, they are. They are
now also much more militant and have have this sort
of experience of organizing that they may that they may
not have had before. And this, you know, it's like
you're the any any any individual movement you're doing in
(11:57):
one place is building up the entire class.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
Yeah, and we can see that we've like been attracting
people who are interested and becoming involved in a movement.
And you know, whether they just graduated from college or
they had some sort of distant relative who was in
a union, they come to new seasons thinking, oh, I
(12:21):
want to get.
Speaker 3 (12:22):
In on the beginning of this.
Speaker 5 (12:24):
And we've seen like a big push of that recently,
and people who leave they want to go, you know,
organize their next workplace. You know, regardless if they were
fired or whatever. They they want to keep it going.
Speaker 4 (12:40):
So and I think to build on that too.
Speaker 2 (12:42):
You know, salting is a practice that traditional unions typically
do to kind of change a workforce. And when you salt,
usually you're paid by the union to go in there.
And so you're getting paid by the employer to be
there and the union is paying you to organize. But
we've seen a shift now where people are voluntarily salting. Right,
people come like out that they get a job. They
don't need the money motivator. They just want to function
(13:04):
up right, They want to change things and like be
antagonistic towards the boss. And I think to me to
go back to an earlier thing you asked about, like
kind of like why Portland, right, Like, I think one
thing about Portland is people in Portland love a protest, right, Like,
we don't need much of a motivation to go through.
Speaker 4 (13:18):
Some rocks at popped, right. That's kind of in the
culture of Portland.
Speaker 2 (13:21):
And so there is this this orientation towards struggle that
does exist. And right now, that energy, you know, we
went through the George Floyd uprising and a lot of
energy has been funneled into labor and it's been new
voices in labor. It's not the same like you know,
ten people now kind of talking. It's all of this
new energy. And for the most part, most of Portland
(13:45):
labor is being very accommodating and making room for those
people to get in there and be heard because folks
recognize that they're on their way out right, you know,
Folks in their fifties or sixties, like they're towards retirement, right,
And so it's as younger folks coming in that are
going to change it, you know.
Speaker 1 (14:00):
Yeah, And I think there's an interesting dynamic with this too,
which is that, you know, okay, one of the one
of the sort of conditions of the last sort of
like forty fifty years of capitalism, Like is is this
sort of high total turnover rates? And also is this
you know, is this thing where you are, like you
as an individual worker are shifting jobs really really quickly,
(14:23):
and that you know, that's in some sense an issue.
But that also means that like I don't know, like
if if you have a bunch of people who you know,
spent like spent one hundred days fighting the Feds and
you know still still may like have have developed just
like the sort of miilited hatred of the cops. And
you know, I've developed sort of and into capitalist politics. Yeah,
(14:43):
you get more of the sort of salt stuff you're
talking about, because like you know, SCRIWT, Like, you know,
if you're gonna be working like a ship job anyways,
you might as well like go work one where you're
saulting and starting a union, because there's not actually like
I don't know, it's not it's not it's not like
you're like getting career advancement in the service job, right,
(15:04):
And yeah, I mean that seems to be driving like
at least some of the sort of of how this
kind of like how the independent United Union organizing in
Portland's been moving.
Speaker 4 (15:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (15:17):
I think I'd also like to point out though that
like a lot of people for our union, specifically, New
Seasons has always been like the progressive business and it's
always had a reputation of like being a great place
to work.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
They're really inclusive or whatever.
Speaker 5 (15:40):
So that's what attracts like a certain crowd of people.
And when they get there and they realize that, like
they're getting screwed over, just like any other place that
they've ever been at that like fosters this new feeling
of like, well, I'm vulnerable no matter what I do,
Like there's no where I can turn to trust my employer,
(16:05):
and how do I preserve what little.
Speaker 3 (16:08):
Dignity that I do have at this workplace?
Speaker 5 (16:11):
Because generally speaking, like our jobs are pretty okay minus
like the corporate business side of things, Like most people
enjoy going to work, maybe, but.
Speaker 3 (16:25):
They they want to enjoy going to work.
Speaker 5 (16:29):
So having that like kind of double edged sword has
been a catalyst for us.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
Just built on what Alex said too.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
I think it's really interesting that a lot of the
surge in new like independent union stuff has been you know,
new seasoned Starbucks to a degree, ARII creator Joe's all
these places, these progressive workplaces, right, And what's happened is
that so often we've had interactions with customers where they go, wow,
(16:59):
I assumed that the prices were so high because your
wages were high, And really, dude, most of us can't
afford to live in the city, right, most of us
are using yeah, and it's just not it's not true, right,
And so you know it's workers who get jobs at
these progressive places that drank the similar social kool aid
that the customer's drink of assuming that these businesses have
(17:20):
good business practices and what's happening is that they're just
getting greedy. Right, This is the case everywhere. It just
hits a little bit different when your employer pretends your
friends and then stabs you in the back.
Speaker 1 (17:30):
Yeah. Not all workplaces have this kind of like oh,
we're like progressive sort of vibes thing. But I feel
like businesses that have that reputation are also more just
more vulnerable. It's not just that like their workers like
realize how ypocritical it is. It means that they're It
means that they're more vulnerable to sort of like damage
to their reputation when people find out that, like oh
(17:50):
my god, hold time, you're making how much money? Like yeah,
and I think, yeah, I don't know, I'm interested, like
how how effective has that been for you? Sort of
like leveraging that.
Speaker 2 (18:02):
I think it's been really effective, I mean, you know,
and not just does. I think a really good example
of exactly what we're talking about, right, is the shareholders
of Starbucks are holding Howard Schultz accountable because he is
wrecking that company. Right, and so with new seasons what
it means is that they play a very sneaky game.
They fight us in the back room. They make sure
it's not public facing. Anything we can do to attack
(18:23):
their public image, like it hurts. I will say too
that you know, we're kind of standing on the shoulders
of Burgerville Workers Union here where Burgerville was built on
this reputation of like local friendly, like we're the alternative
to like corporate fast food, and they had security guards
and strike busters literally fighting with picketers in the past
(18:44):
and it tanked the reputation. And so New Seasons management
has clearly looked at what Burgerville management did and been like,
we're not going to do that. It doesn't stop them
from being phitty. They're just they're more polite when they're
streitty to us. They're still just as shitty. They're just
they smile while they stab us in the back.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
Yeah, So on the subject just of stabbing us in
the back. So there's been a bunch of stuff going
on recently. I was wondering if you could talk about
like the I don't know, the recent unrest. Question Mark
need to figure out a better way to phrase this, but.
Speaker 5 (19:23):
Yeah, yeah, so, yeah, we've been building up we have,
I mean since day one of bargaining, which started back
in like December or January.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
It started in January.
Speaker 5 (19:36):
Yeah, so we we've known that eventually it's going to
get to a point where we're going to need to.
Speaker 3 (19:44):
Show some force.
Speaker 5 (19:46):
So, you know, we go in there with good faith,
and little by little we find out that the smallest
ask is going to be impossible, and we find out
that they're going to do whatever they can get away
with every time they can. So they started with I mean,
(20:07):
they did all kinds of things, but the one catalyst
is they changed the attendance policy for non union workers
and non union stores to make it more lenient, which
was one of the issues that we campaigned on was
(20:27):
the attendance policy because it's ridiculous and people get fired
all the time. So we demanded the bargain. They didn't
have a response.
Speaker 3 (20:38):
We brought it up in bargaining at the bargaining table.
Speaker 5 (20:41):
They said that they would work on something that we
could implement before we ratify the contract.
Speaker 3 (20:50):
But they had to put it through their DEI lens
and they had to Yeah.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
Yeah, and you know all the things that say to
delay it and kick the can down the road. So
we're Dylan good faith saying like, okay, you know, go ahead.
Speaker 3 (21:10):
So then we did.
Speaker 5 (21:11):
A petition where all the stores individually had people sign
a petition. We got hundreds of signatures, and then we
did a march on the boss asking them to sign
this MoU that a memorandum of understanding saying you will
give us that same policy. We filed a ULP saying
(21:35):
like this is illegal, it's obvious discrimination, and then they
just kept saying, Okay, we're working on it, We're working
on it, We're working on it.
Speaker 3 (21:46):
So they never did.
Speaker 5 (21:47):
Then we did a rally and we showed up at
the headquarters with I don't know, probably two hundred of
us Hell yeah, and marched up to the office and
chanted and made a scene.
Speaker 3 (22:05):
And told them they have one more.
Speaker 5 (22:07):
Chance to sign the m OU. They didn't sign it.
So then we organized the strikes at the two stores and.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
Gave them one more chance to sign the MoU. They
didn't sign it. We already knew they weren't going to.
Speaker 5 (22:24):
So yeah, we shut down those stores for the rest
of the day at Grant Park and for one hour
at ourbor Lodge, and it was powerful.
Speaker 3 (22:36):
We had a lot of support a lot of people
showed up.
Speaker 4 (22:41):
Yeah, and to build on that too.
Speaker 2 (22:46):
You know, there's things coming up that we can't talk
about yet, but I would say that, Alex, do you
want to talk about the practice picketing?
Speaker 4 (22:54):
I feel like we could talk about that.
Speaker 5 (22:56):
Okay, so we actually can talk about We just filed
the ULP, yeah, last night for bad faith bargaining.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Yeahs an unfair labor practice.
Speaker 3 (23:07):
Yes, thank you. I get caught up in the jargon.
So we just.
Speaker 5 (23:10):
Filed that last night for bad faith bargaining yep, because
they gave us the most ridiculous policy for attendance. It's
basically regressive bargaining, which is totally unfair.
Speaker 1 (23:26):
Yeah, do you want to explain what that is?
Speaker 2 (23:28):
Basically, the NLRB the National Labor Relations Board. They oversee
unions and the relationship between unions and employers. They demand
that both sides come in good faith, basically like, don't
screw around, don't waste each other's time. The goal is
to move towards some sort of compromise and an agreement.
And regressive bargaining is when you backpedal and you offer
(23:52):
something that is worse than what was offered. The attendance
policy is in my opinion, definitely worse. It is no better.
I think Frank takes the shittiest things of the past
two policies and put them together. So it seems pretty
clear to us that it's regressive. And then we can
argue that New Seasons is not acting in good faith.
They are acting in bad faith, which is illegal according
(24:12):
to the NRB. And so what we are allowed to
do is file an unfair labor practice, which basically, you know,
it doesn't hold a lot of weight materially, however, symbolically
it looks really bad. And so again going back to
like Mia what you were saying about kind of like
their image, right, Like these kind of progressive corporations, they
don't want to look like the bastards they are, And
(24:35):
a UOP makes it pretty clear, Hey, this person's being
a jerk, this company is being a jerk. So the
more ulps that we get file that, like we win
on the bigger case, we can paint that New Seasons
is actually being really unfair to us.
Speaker 5 (24:47):
Yeah, so then based on that, we're getting strike ready.
We're making sure everybody can show up and be ready
to assert our stance. We're not going to just lay
back and let them take over. So we're going to
(25:11):
do some practice pickets. Oh and I'm sure even hearing
that a lot, which is great for I mean, and
if you want to bring it back to like the
higher turnover rate and like, you know, the general apathy
that you see in any union. People are just kind
(25:31):
of afraid to be active. So we're looking at practice
pickets as a way to get people.
Speaker 3 (25:38):
Involved in a really low risk activity.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
Can you explain how that works?
Speaker 5 (25:45):
Yeah, So what we're going to do is each store
will do a picket, but that picket will not be
a strike.
Speaker 3 (25:53):
That picket will not.
Speaker 5 (25:56):
Encourage shoppers to leave or discourage shopping in any way.
Speaker 3 (26:04):
We're not calling for a boycott.
Speaker 5 (26:05):
We're just simply doing logistically, what does it look like
if we do a picket at each store in the
most peaceful way possible, and then we do that at
every store and we kind of gauge, like, you know,
how ready are we.
Speaker 4 (26:24):
And by doing that too, it's a show of force
to the company.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Right, Yeah, we're not doing anything illegal.
Speaker 2 (26:29):
It's effectively an informational picket. So legally, there's nothing that
New Seasons can do to any of the workers who
participate in it. However, they will absolutely see that we
are prepared to do it. The team Staris recently did
this for ups. A lot of teachers unions have done
similar things. It's a really good show of force to
kind of leverage your people power and show the management
(26:50):
that you're ready.
Speaker 1 (26:52):
Yeah, and it has another It has another effect too,
which is something that you know, the kind of basic
cultural understanding of you know, what unions are, how they function,
what you need to be doing any given scenario, like
me just physically, how to like do pickets, what you
logistically need to do. That stuff has all sort of
(27:12):
faded from like the height of union sort of culture
in like the sixties and seventies, And that's something that
you have to rebuild because you know, and and and
then and this is this is something that's both both
in terms of the people in the union. That sort
of knowledge is tuitional knowledge has to be rebuilt, and
it also has to be rebuilt in the public because
people sort of just don't you know, like you support
(27:34):
for unions is really high, uh, but people don't understand
exactly what like you know, people people don't understand exactly
what a union is doing any given time or like
how it functions and things like that, and you know,
then this is this seems like a really good way
to like, you know, like, hey, this is a picket.
This is what happens when there's a picket. This is
an informational picket. We're gonna give you information. And yes,
(27:57):
it seems like a good thing for building up that
kind of true on both ends.
Speaker 2 (28:02):
And it's a really good opportunity to talk to customers,
get them involved. That's the thing that's that you know
New Season's kind of tagline as the friendliest store in town,
and the way that they built that, Yeah, the way that
they built that reputation though, was by really encouraging workers
to develop deep relationships with customers. And so we're using
(28:22):
that to leverage against the company now and saying like hey,
like you.
Speaker 4 (28:25):
Know you like me, like you know me by name
and I know you by name. You don't know the
CEO by name, Like let's talk.
Speaker 2 (28:31):
Let's talk about like what we're asking for and what
you as a customer can do to support us in
a way that doesn't feel antagonistic, right like like when
we had the when we had the walkouts on Labor Day, weekend.
Speaker 4 (28:43):
You know, we did a debrief and.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
We're kind of like, how do we, like, how do
we engage with people where we can hold onto our
values and still feel like we're being effective. And Randy,
a worker at our lodge, his solution, instead of calling
people who cross the picket line scabs and like you know,
harassing them that way, you know, he was like, I
just said, like, hey, I'm disappointed in you, and I
think that like, like, yeah, like let's just like we're
(29:05):
gonna just like if you're going to cross the picket line,
I don't need to hurl insults at you. I'm just
gonna guilt trip you and let you know that like
I'm disappointed in you, and like you will feel bad
as you're shopping. And I think that like that's sort
of how we can align the progressive values that attracted
people to New Seasons to work there in the first
place with how we do actions while still being militant, right,
we don't.
Speaker 4 (29:24):
Want to be soft. We just got to make sure
that like it vibes with what we're about, you know.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
Yeah, And and that's that's another you know, I think
this this also gets back to the sort of culture
part of it, which is like, yeah, like rebuilding the
standard of do not cross a picket line is a
thing that has to be done because that's again that's
another thing that has sort of faded. And yeah, like
guilt tripping people is a good way to do it,
because yeah, you know, like sort of especially especially sort
(29:54):
of like middle and upper middle class progressive people like
really really there are a lot of their politics about
wanting to feel good about themselves and you.
Speaker 6 (30:03):
Know, make they can see Yeah, I think if they
can see themselves in us too, they will relate and
they they won't want to.
Speaker 3 (30:17):
Go against their own values, which is our.
Speaker 5 (30:21):
Values, because that's the culture of Portland generally speaking.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Did you have anything else that you want to make
sure to get in before we wrap up.
Speaker 5 (30:30):
Yeah, we would love to push our gofund me that
can be found at our website, which is really hard
to find is but yeah, you have to type it in,
you can't just google it.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
Okay, Well we'll put it. We'll just we'll just put
a link to it in the okay, Yeah.
Speaker 5 (30:51):
Yeah, yeah, if anybody you know, we're out here being
independent union.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
We have no money.
Speaker 5 (30:58):
We're just looking for maybe some sort of strike fund
for those in need when we are strike ready, and
also you know, materials whatever people can donate, it would
be amazing.
Speaker 2 (31:13):
Final notes I would say too, is that you know
when we started this, I mean, we're an independent union
of grocery workers, right.
Speaker 4 (31:20):
We did all of this in our volunteer time.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
None of us are lawyers, none of a lot of
us had never been in a union before or had
very limited experience. We build this all from the ground
up with tons of volunteer hours of our own time
after work. And we have gone toe to toe with
Ogle Tree Deacons, who is one of the largest anti
union law firms in the country. That's who New Seasons
(31:44):
has retained. We've gone toe to toe with them. We
have a lawyer now who is really graciously kind of
letting us write her.
Speaker 4 (31:52):
In IOU for the time being.
Speaker 2 (31:54):
But even before her we were still able to hold
her own against a major anti union law firm.
Speaker 5 (32:00):
Right.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
There is power in workers coming together collectively. It's not
as easy as it should be to find that information,
but it is out there and there are people who
want to share it. And I would say that, like
for me, the labor movement has been a really empowering
place to come into. You know, I have a lot
of experience with sort of like leftists, like street activism,
(32:22):
but I think that for anybody who wants to be
involved in the struggle and is also like looking for
ways to make.
Speaker 1 (32:29):
In rids and develop community like.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Labors where it's at right, I mean, we all work
and to a degree, we all hit our jobs and
have something to complain about, and like that's a commonality
that stretches across the aisle and allows for a lot
of solidarity in a way that the culture war really
doesn't want and really, like you know, it's by design, right,
the capitalists want us fighting against each other, and the
(32:53):
labor movement is a way for the working class to
unite because it's about class war.
Speaker 4 (32:57):
You know.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Yeah, here here, yeah, and you know this this should
go without saying. I'm going to say it anyways, you also,
listener at home can do this too. There is you know,
there there is nothing sort of magical or special about
the people who do union organizing other than the fact
that they decide to organize a union. So you can
(33:22):
do this too. You can form an independent union and yeah,
you can go hand your bosses a fucking ass and
get better, you know, get better working conditions and get
better things for you and your entire class in the process.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
Yeah, I would say Labor Notes is a great resource
for early information. The Coalition of Independent Unions is on
Instagram and workers from around the country have reached out
to them for advice. You know, we're on Instagram. You
can ask us questions. Reach out to independent unions and
ask them questions. This is a labor movement made up
of the workers for the workers. We want more workers
(33:55):
to organize.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Yeah, and I think on that note, Yeah, this is
this is been naked happen here, Go into the world
and fight.
Speaker 3 (34:03):
Yeah, thank you, thank you so much.
Speaker 2 (34:05):
Maya.
Speaker 3 (34:10):
It could Happen here as a production of cool Zone Media.
Speaker 5 (34:13):
For more podcasts from cool Zone Media, visit our website
cool zonemedia dot com or check us out on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
monthly at coolzonemedia dot com slash sources.
Speaker 5 (34:27):
Thanks for listening.
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James Stout
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