Grocery East Employer wage proposal way off the mark!

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Our Union Member Bargaining Committee met again this week. We continue to fight for wages that respect our work, maintaining and improving our healthcare, and improvements to our pension. While we know that cost of living is skyrocketing in Spokane and across the region, the Employer representative continued to argue that wages should remain lower than other grocery store wages in the State. We have a long way to go to get the wages and benefits we deserve.

However, we did reach several important Tentative Agreements:  

  • Safeway contributions of $0.03/hour to secure our retirement funding. 

  • Improved vacation accruals. We won vacation accruals based off the average of hours worked in the previous 12 months. This will help ensure that no worker gets less vacation per week than they normally work per week.  

  • Aligned notice of technological changes in the store with other UFCW 3000 grocery store contracts.  

  • Greater scheduling notice so people can plan their lives, changing initial notice from Thursday to Tuesday 6 pm in Safeway/Albertsons.  

While we made progress on many issues like vacation, retirement funding, and scheduling, we are still far apart on the most important issue- wages. 

The employer proposal included: 

  • A 5-year contract—Longer than usual until we can bargain a new agreement. 

  • $0.50 per year for the Journey Rates of pay—Lower than what workers got in California, Colorado, Oregon, and Western Washington. 

  • Paying less in healthcare contributions and reducing our plan reserves. 

The Union Member Bargaining Committee told the employer that their opening proposal was way off the mark from what we deserve. 

Our Union Member Bargaining Comittee continued to propose common sense proposals:   

  • Create Journey wage increases of multiple dollars over the life of the contract. 

  • Institute one wage scale for all UFCW 3000 Eastern Washington, Oregon and Northern Idaho and the same journey wage rate across all grocery scales. 

  • Gain ground on Puget Sound clerk wage rates, because cost of living is high everywhere! 

  • Create raises of multiple dollars for Journey Meat Cutters over the life of the contract, a proposed dollar premium for Head Meat Cutter, and new designation of Head Butcher Block.  

  • Increase the amount to $0.25 between steps so that every step sees an increase as the minimum wage increases with cost of living. 

  • Reduce the length of our wage scales so our coworkers can reach the Journey rate sooner.  

  • Maintain our strong healthcare plan and coverage and improve benefits without increasing employee premiums.  

  • Fund our pension and increase contributions and benefits for future earned benefits.  

  • Institute resort store pay premiums for Chelan, Leavenworth, Sandpoint and CDA. 

  • Create premiums for Person-In-Charge pay.

  • Make a quicker path to Journey for Meat Cutters that complete the Meat Apprenticeship program.  

  • Ensure full back pay to date of expiration. 

 We continued to fight for non-economic proposals including: 

  • Funding for workforce training so we can get the training we need and expand the meat cutters apprenticeship around the state of Washington, Oregon and Idaho.   

  • Worker Severance and Retention language to ensure that, in the event of any merger or sale of the companies, the company must retain workers for a set period and compensate workers fairly if they are laid off or terminated.   

 Next bargaining dates: February 8, 9, 15 and 16.  

Join us and show our unity in fighting for a strong contract!

More information:

Grocery East Bargaining Update

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Our union member Bargaining Committee had our second bargaining session with the Employers to fight for a safer workplace, maintain and strengthen our benefits, and improve wages.

Over the two days of bargaining, we came to several Tentative Agreements:

  • Greater Workplace Safety. We secured an agreement for a Master Safety Committee, which will allow us to raise safety issues that are not being addressed at the store level, up to the corporate Management level. We also established yearly walk-through trainings for emergency situations, including natural disasters and active shooter situations.

  • Increases to Leaves of Absences for personal illness/pregnancy from 6 months to 9 months.

  • The ability to keep our information updated so that we can get critical information about our wages, benefits and working conditions.

We continued to trade proposals over important contract language items, including:

  • Funding for Workforce Training, so we can get the training we need and expand the Meat Cutters Apprenticeship Program around the state of Washington.

  • Worker Severance and Retention language to ensure that, in the event of any merger or sale of the companies, the Employer must retain workers for a set period and compensate workers fairly if there are lay offs or terminations.

  • Allowing workers to accept tips from customers.

We also proposed the following IMPROVEMENTS to our contract:

  • Improve vacation accruals and lower qualifying threshold for vacation. We proposed vacation accruals be based off the average of hours worked in the previous 12 months. This will help ensure that no worker gets less vacation per week than they normally work per week. Additionally, we proposed to lower the threshold to qualify for vacation from 1000 hours to 800 hours worked in a year.

  • Increased scheduling notice so we can better plan our lives.

  • Add Presidents Day as an additional holiday.

  • Align past experience credit among all contracts so workers can claim more hours upon hire.

We proposed the following UPDATES to our contract:

  • Align notice of technological changes in the store with other UFCW 3000 grocery store contracts.

Finally, we made a comprehensive economic proposal that would:

  • Create Journey wage increases of multiple dollars over the life of the contract.

  • Institute one wage scale for all UFCW 3000 Eastern Washington, Oregon and Northern Idaho and the same journey wage rate across all grocery scales.

  • Gain ground on Puget Sound clerk wage rates, because the cost of living is high everywhere!

  • Create raises of multiple dollars for Journey Meat Cutters over the life of the contract, a proposed dollar premium for Head Meat Cutter, and new designation of Head Butcher Block.

  • Increase the amount between steps from $0.10 above minimum wage and $0.05 between steps to $0.25 and above the minimum wage and between steps so that every step sees an increase as the minimum wage increases with cost of living.

  • Reduce the length of our wage scales so our coworkers can reach the Journey rate sooner.

  • Maintain our strong healthcare plan and coverage and improve benefits without increasing employee premiums.

  • Fund our pension and increase contributions and benefits for future earned benefits.

  • Institute resort store pay premiums for Chelan, Leavenworth, Sandpoint and CDA.

  • Award $800 longevity bonuses for workers with more than 10 years of service.

  • Create premiums for short staffing & Person-In-Charge pay.

  • Make a quicker path to Journey for Meat Cutters that complete the Meat Apprenticeship program.

  • Ensure full back pay to date of expiration.

Next bargaining dates: January 10, 11 and 12

Join us and show our unity in fighting for a strong contract!

Our Union Member Bargaining Team Make Proposals to Improve Lives at Work, Kroger and Albertsons Propose Takeaways

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Our Union Member Bargaining Team Made Proposals to Improve Our Lives at Work, Kroger and Albertsons Propose Takeaways

After preparing for months, our union member bargaining committee had our first bargaining sessions with the employer to negotiate a new contract. Kim Bristlin (Safeway 1159), one of the many grocery store workers on our bargaining committee, started our first session by sharing how the costs of living is up everywhere and that we need a new contract that respects the work we do to support our customers, our communities, and our stores.

Here’s a quick round up of the two days of negotiations. As a reminder, the way the bargaining process works is that our committee makes proposals, the employer makes proposals, and we work back and forth to try to come to an agreement. Typically we work on non-economic proposals first, and economics (like wages) next. Every member staying informed and involved during bargaining will help win the best improvements. In the end, you as union members will be the one to vote – that is part of being in our democratic union.

We made some big proposals to make our workplaces better including:
  • Funding for workforce training for career pathways and development
  • Greater workplace safety including a Master Safety Committee and in-store training for emergency situations.
  • Union-led New Hire Orientations so our co-workers understand their union rights and benefits.
  • Successorship language which would require a new employer to keep the union contract and the staff if the company is sold or merged.
  • Worker severance and retention so if our company is sold or merged we keep our jobs for a period of time, and are compensated fairly in the event of lay-offs or store closure.
  • Allow workers to accept tips.
  • Improve vacation accruals and lower qualifying threshold for vacation.
  • A 2-week scheduling notice so we can better plan our lives.
  • Add Presidents Day as an additional holiday.
  • Increase Leave of Absence time.
  • Expand past experience credit for prior service.
  • And other updates to our contract including moving Eastern Oregon workers onto the Spokane Healthcare Trust.
We also already won some early victories with tentative agreements on:
  • Prior notification and bargaining over temporary J-1/Guest Workers.
  • Allow for more union leave for union stewards.
  • Greater Bereavement benefit so we can get time off work to grieve a family member even if there is no formal funeral service.
Unfortunately, Kroger and Albertsons proposed major takeaways on our first days of negotiations.

They proposed:
  • Elimination of overtime after 8 hours.
  • After a global pandemic, elimination of contractual sick leave banks.
  • Adding more management to do our work.
  • Elimination of weekly hour guarantees that protect our ability to get healthcare.
  • Refusal to recognize past experience at hiring.

Kroger and Albertsons need to stop proposing takeaways and respect our work by investing in us.
 

Here are three things you can do to take action and show your support for the bargaining team:

1. Come to a Contract Action Team Meeting!

Spokane, UFCW 3000 office
December 5 from 5:30 – 6:30 PM
2805 N. Market St.
 
Tri-Cities, UFCW 3000 Office
December 6 from 5:30-6:30 PM
2505 Duportail St, Suite D
Richland, WA 99352-4079
 
Wenatchee, UFCW 3000 Office
December 6 from 5:30-6:30 PM
330 King St, Suite 4

Yakima, UFCW 3000 office
December 7 from 5:30- 6:30 PM
507 S. 3rd St

2. Sign a Strike Pledge Card – please contact your store steward or Union Rep to add your name!
3. Wear a union button!
 

More information:
  1. To help Stop the Merger, go to nogrocerymerger.com
  2. For information about your healthcare (Rehn):
    1. >> ufcwhealth.com
    2. Phone: 800-872-8979
  3. For Pension Questions  (Zenith):
    1. 800-225-7629
    2. >> soundretirementtrust.com
 

Invitation to Join our Live Telephone Town Hall - 11/15/23

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Good day to our grocery store members from east of the Cascades! We would like to invite you to join our live Telephone Town Hall on Wednesday November 15 at 4:30 PM to discuss our upcoming contract negotiations. We have been building our collective strength for several months – taking surveys, filling out updated contact information, and making commitments to do what is necessary to win better staffing and training, higher wages, protected health and pension benefits, and more.

When we call you at 4:30 on Wednesday, simply answer your phone to join the call.

If for some reason by 4:35 on Wednesday you do not receive a call, or your call gets disconnected, you can join us by dialing 888-652-0384 and entering Meeting ID: 7644.

We look forward to speaking with you on Wednesday and taking your questions live on the call.

Grocery East - Bargaining Update

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“Me and my coworkers don’t expect to get rich working at Fred Meyer. We just don’t think we should have to make a choice between paying our utility bills or rent or mortgage. We deserve a better wage.” 

—Melissa Lozano, Richland Fred Meyer, Shoe Department Lead 

This week our union member bargaining team met to become more informed about our union pension, healthcare plan, and professional training fund.  Now we are ready to go out and educate and support our co-workers with this essential information. We are excited to fight to strengthen and protect our union benefits in bargaining. 

We also were briefed by the Director of WeTrain, our union’s first professional development training fund in the country for people working as meat cutters and in grocery stores.In contract negotiations, we are ready to push to expand this benefit to Eastern Washington, Idaho, and Oregon.  

Our committee discussed the proposed Kroger/Albertsons merger and the ways it would harm us as workers and consumers.Our union, in partnership with locals around the country, has been outspoken in our opposition to this proposed merger since it was announced over a year ago because it threatens jobs, communities and customers. We need Kroger and Albertsons executives to invest in us, not their pocketbooks.  

Join us by: 

  • Coming to a Contract Action Team Meeting:

    • October 25 | 5:30-6:30 in Tri Cities-Wenatchee
      UFCW 3000 office: 330 King St, Suite 4

    • October 26 | 5:30-6:30 in Spokane
      UFCW 3000 office: 2805 N. Market St.

    • October 27 | 5:30-6:30 in Yakima
      UFCW 3000 office: 507 S. 3rd St

  • Signing a Strike Pledge Card 

  • Joining our Telephone Townhall on 11/15 at 4:30 PM (We’ll call you!) 

  • Joining our Worker Research Committee, meeting on Monday, November 6 at 5:30 pm via Zoom!

  • Wearing a union button 


We plan to meet with the employers’ representatives at the end of November! 

Grocery East Bargaining Update!

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Our Union Bargaining Team: Josh Frans SWY 1799, Tresa Fairbanks SWY 3255, Vanessa Evans SWY 1473, Katrina Keffer FM 214, Amanda Bowerman SWY 1494, Shelly Clark SWY 1470, Frankie Roessner SWY 1242, Jeff Yergens SWY 3255, Joyce Laffelmacher ALB 265, James Perez SWY 502, Stephen Bunting SWY 2248, Ann Jennings SWY 1630, Vanessa Roessner ROS 126, Melisa Lozano FM 486, Kim Bristlin SWY 1159, Clayton Bennett ALB 206, Ross Cook SWY 3288, Jeff Terpening SWY 3255

As union members, every three years we get to bargain a legally binding contract that sets our wages, benefits and working conditions. Now we are starting the process of bargaining a new contract for the next three years.

“We are ready to fight for a strong contract with livable wages, better training and staffing, safety, and strong benefits!” —Vanessa Roessner (Rosauers 126) & Jeff Terpening (Safeway 3255)

This week, our Union Bargaining Team met for a full day of planning and preparation to get ready to bargain a strong contract for Grocery workers in Eastern Washington and Idaho. We spent the day discussing the bargaining process, going over the results of the Union Bargaining Survey, and preparing proposals that reflect what we need in order to make our workplaces and jobs stronger. Things like higher wages, our pension, corporate merger concerns, pandemic language and workplace safety protections.

For too long our wages have been falling behind. The cost of housing, groceries, and other living expenses are skyrocketing. Despite what the Employer may think, the cost of living is going up in all our communities and we deserve wage increases that will make these livable jobs.

We also discussed upcoming actions and brainstormed ways to show the Employer that we are serious about winning a fair contract. There are a few things we can do today to help build strength and momentum: wear a Union button, add your contact information to the phone tree, sign the Stand Together Pledge Card, and join one of the Contract Action Team meetings where we can talk about the negotiations process, ask questions, and plan next steps!

Upcoming Contract Action Team Meeting:

October 25 | 5:30-6:30 in Tri Cities-Wenatchee: UFCW 3000 office: 330 King St, Suite 4

October 26 | 5:30-6:30 in Spokane: UFCW 3000 office: 2805 N. Market St.

October 27 | 5:30-6:30 in Yakima: UFCW 3000 office: 507 S. 3rd St

Join the next Grocery Store Worker Telephone Townhall call on October 23! (all you have to do is pick up when we call)