(The following story by Mike Freeman and Penni Crabtree appeared on the San Diego Union-Tribune website on February 8.)
SAN DIEGO — By traditional measures, the Southern California grocery strike would seem to be going well for the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
Most customers have honored picket lines, strikers have held fast, and the union has inflicted financial damage on the three supermarket chains – Albertsons, Safeway-owned Vons and Kroger’s Ralphs, which have lost combined sales of $1 billion because of the fight.
But so far, it hasn’t worked. After 122 days in an increasingly bitter standoff, the end of the dispute seems no closer than it was Oct. 11, when the strike began.
Labor experts point to several reasons why the battle has lasted so long. Ultimately, however, they say the group of seven Southern California UFCW locals tackled the regional dispute like a backyard fight – only to find themselves outmaneuvered by three megacorporations with a broader, nationwide agenda.
“The union in this instance underestimated the commitment on the part of the supermarkets to drastically alter the labor relations scenario,” said Kent Wong, director of the UCLA Center for Labor Research and Education. “It was taken by surprise by just how fierce and how willing the chains were to risk hundreds of millions of dollars in profits, and their reputations, to bust the union and drastically drive down labor costs.”
While the fight is far from over – the AFL-CIO entered the fray last month to expand the conflict nationally – labor experts say grocers have enjoyed the upper hand.
A call last week by the UFCW for arbitration, which the supermarket chains flatly rejected, was viewed by some labor experts as a sign that the union’s resolve could be weakening.
The outcome of the Southern California dispute could have major ramifications as the chains look for contract concessions in other parts of the country. Grocery contracts in several cities, including Denver, Chicago and Las Vegas, expire in coming weeks.
Some labor and legal experts say the union’s strategy has been marred by miscalculations, most notably a failure to grasp just how much business the supermarket chains were willing to sacrifice in hopes of changing the salary and benefits structure of the unionized grocery industry.
The supermarkets say they’re taking such a hard line because they have to prepare for the entry in California of nonunion retail behemoth Wal-Mart, which offers clerks far less in salary and benefits.
Although Southern California union leaders say they knew the grocers would play rough, they also apparently misjudged the supermarket chains’ determination to stick to their demands and weather a long strike.
“Did anybody imagine this could go on for 18 weeks?” said Mickey Kasparian, president of UFCW Local 135 in San Diego. “Who thought this would go 18 weeks?”
The strike and lockout, which involves 70,000 workers and 860 stores, has become one of the longest supermarket labor disputes in U.S. history. The union struck Vons on Oct. 11, and Albertsons and Ralphs then locked out their workers.
Although both sides are trying to reschedule talks with a federal mediator this week, no date has been set.
An early indication of just how serious the supermarkets were came in mid-November, when it was made public that the chains had made a pact before negotiations started to share revenue if there was a strike.
“No one really knows what the resolve is on the other side unless there are these donnybrooks,” said Richard Paul, an employment law attorney and professor of employment law at the USD Law School. “But one can’t miss the message that the revenue-sharing agreement sent about the determination of management.”
The union didn’t miss the message. Within days of the supermarket agreement being made public, the UFCW pulled out its big gun. It began picketing grocery distribution centers. That resulted in Teamsters drivers and warehouse workers walking off their jobs.
In past labor disputes, the UFCW has relied on the Teamsters to disrupt deliveries and bring supermarkets back to the table. This time, though the action caused product shortages at supermarkets, the grocers didn’t budge. In a gesture of good will, the UFCW pulled its pickets and allowed the Teamsters to return to their jobs in late December after about a month off work.
The chains remained unmoved, and in December turned down concessions the union said were worth upward of $500 million over the next three years without making a counteroffer.
According to labor experts, the hard-line stance highlights a key advantage for supermarkets – the ability to bring nationwide resources to bear against a regional foe.
“The problem from the union point of view is you have all 70,000 workers out, but from the employers’ side, it’s only a small portion of your operation that’s paralyzed,” said Harley Shaiken, a professor at the University of California Berkeley who specializes in labor issues.
Some analysts said the union was too slow to communicate its side of the issues to the public, particularly in the early stages of the strike.
Meanwhile, the supermarket chains managed to trivialize the union’s stance as a refusal to take on a little out-of-pocket expense for their medical care, said some observers.
Some say the supermarket chains also did a masterful job of trumpeting the prospect of nonunion Wal-Mart entering the region.
“I give the chains credit for a great PR snow job,” said Donald Cohen, president of the Center for Policy Initiatives, a pro-labor think tank in San Diego.
“This is about three companies that want to turn the entire structure of employment in an entire industry into jobs without health care benefits and salaries, where people would have to get second jobs,” Cohen said. “An industry of the working poor.”
Union officials say the supermarkets’ profits have increased 91 percent in the past three years. However, grocery stores make their money at a much slower pace than, say, computer chip makers or even furniture sellers.
Profit margins are only 2 percent to 3 percent of sales, giving them an advantage in the strike.
“Grocers make a ton of money but they make it slowly, and that means they also lose money slowly during a strike,” said Marcus Widenor, assistant professor at the University of Oregon’s Labor Education and Research Center.
The remaining wild card in this fight is the AFL-CIO, which is mobilizing a national campaign. Already, the umbrella organization for American labor is launching efforts against grocers in six metro areas, including Northern California; Baltimore; Philadelphia; Washington, D.C.; and Seattle.
But organizing nationwide labor actions takes time, Widenor said. After such a long strike, he wonders if UFCW locals remain resolved.
“The danger here is the effort started too late,” he said. “It’s not clear how long people are willing to take a strike.”
Joseph Uehlein, director of strategic campaigns for the AFL-CIO, said the organization has a long history of nationwide campaigns. A decade ago, it orchestrated a 20-month battle against Swiss-owned Ravenswood Aluminum Co. in West Virginia that involved actions in 22 countries.
“We won that,” Uehlein said. “We won with the Boeing engineers three years ago when nobody said we could win. Our history has been full of examples of where we’ve been declared dead and won, and I’m afraid there’s a little bit of that in this situation.”