Dive Brief:
- Whole Foods Market workers at one of the grocer’s Philadelphia locations have filed a petition with the National Labor Regulations Board to hold a union election, according to a Friday press release.
- Supported by the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1776, employees at the store claim the grocer “refuses to pay their workers a living wage.”
- If the vote for the union passes, this would be the first Whole Foods location to be unionized, according to UFCW Local 1776.
Dive Insight:
The employees at Whole Foods’ Philly Center City store located at 2101 Pennsylvania Ave. took to social media on Friday to announce their goal to establish a union and stated an “overwhelming majority” of them aim to establish a “collective voice to fight for what we deserve.”
According to the workers, their jobs are physically demanding and the rate they are expected to work increases every day. “It is becoming impossible to balance our health, our safety, and our desire to satisfy and delight our customers with the company’s thirst for profits,” the workers said in a statement, adding that “pockets grow deeper” for Amazon and Whole Foods executives Jason Buechel and Jeff Bezos along with other major Amazon shareholders.
A date has not yet been set for the union vote.
In an emailed statement, a Whole Foods spokesperson said the specialty grocer recognizes its staff’s right to decide if union representation is best.
“We agree with the overwhelming majority of our Team Members who value our open door policy and our ability to quickly respond to the needs of our workforce,” the spokesperson said.
While the Philly City Center location could be the first Whole Foods store to unionize, it is not the first time the specialty grocer has seen employees attempt to form a union.
In 2018, a group of Whole Foods workers emailed nearly all of the grocer’s employees urging them to unionize and called for the establishment of a “cross-regional” committee to address worker grievances with the company. Staff members at the time claimed they were unhappy with current compensation and benefits, had concerns with recent layoffs and worried these problems would worsen under Amazon’s ownership.
In 2022, the first Amazon warehouse in the U.S. became unionized.
In recent years, Amazon has had a contentious relationship with workers trying to unionize, The New York Times reported. At the end of September, Amazon came under fire when the NLRB alleged the company violated federal labor laws as a joint employer of California logistics employees represented by the Teamster’s union, sister publication HR Dive reported. Amazon responded claiming there were no merits to any of NLRB’s claims and that Teamsters had been “misrepresenting the facts here for over 15 months.”
