I’m an IWW member, and have been since I was involved with an IWW organizing campaign in 2001 at Nature’s on Division St. (the same store that saw a UFCW drive a few years previous). I learned a lot about organizing in natural foods from that experience, especially since we lost the union representation election.

I currently work at New Seasons, and let me tell you, the place isn’t necessarily the heaven on earth that most of our customers seem to think it is.

IWW members have been watching the Food Front decertification with interest. If anyone at FF would like to talk to our union, please contact our office at 503-231-5488. We are not explicitly interested in bargaining for another contract at FF. In fact, our union’s philosophy is that there are more direct ways to organize for gains on the job, even if a union is recognized by the boss.

Best to you all! In solidarity,

Red Grocer

I’m not trying to speak for you. I’m speaking for myself and my colleagues who busted our humps and risked our jobs to get much needed representation at Nature’s and Food Front. When Food Front certified and got a contract, it was a huge victory for all natural foods workers in Portland. We can’t point to that anymore, and that’s a shame.

I’m truly sorry you couldn’t work it out with UFCW. I said “the union started to take this one tiny shop for granted.” I saw this happening as soon as the original rep (who had a background in community organizing) left UFCW.

Good luck to you all without a contract. I sincerely hope management continues to honor the spirit of it: respect for seniority, regular step raises, no favoritism and no arbitrary discrimination. But if history is any indicator, that’s not very likely.

Maybe you were around when the UFCW came in. However, you haven’t been there in recent years. YEARS AND YEARS where we wouldn’t see a union rep unless they were coming in to count the number of dues paying members on the schedule. YEARS without ONE grievance filed.

The grievance that was filed by an employee regarding sexual harassment was actually taken care of through in store policies, NOT through the union.

In fact, there were two other grievances filed since. One was filed, and the union waited so long, the window of time expired for any action to be taken. What’s extra humorous about that one is that management took care of the issue LONG before the union got back to them.

The other grievance was dismissed because it had no warrant. The union agreed that the proper paperwork was submitted in regards to the employees constant tardiness (hours late) and absenteeism.

Yes, we’re looking into another union. Yes, we’re talking of an internal organization. Yes, we’re looking to COOPERATE.

People assume that we are wooed by management. That we have no mind of our own. It’s insulting at best. Do you realize that most of us went against our personal politics? That it was one of the most troubling and difficult decisions many of us have ever made about a place of employment? Or, do you just assume that we’re mindless children being led blindly by our managers?

It’s insulting, childish, and judgmental. You don’t know all of the facts. You don’t understand how much of a toll this took on many of us.

CHECK YOUR FUCKING FACTS before talking shit about a bunch of people living paycheck to paycheck trying to do what is best for the COLLECTIVE.

In other words, the fact that it is consumer-owned means precisely nothing to the worker’s relationship to her employer.

By the way, membership benefits, including a discount and the ability to volunteer in exchange for a greater discount, were curtailed while I worked there. Not surprisingly, management blamed the union for this, even though nobody from the union ever complained about it.

It’s a bit of a gimmick, really, but it certainly works to satisfy customers (like Nordstrom, they’d let you return a set of tires from Les Schwab if you bitched hard enough). As far as working conditions, though, it doesn’t go all that far.

Employees still have no protection against favoritism in promotions, raises and scheduling, no real grievance process, and nobody’s got their back when it comes to trying to make changes in the work place. The boss holds all the cards, which is precisely the point of a union.

How are they “empowered”? They’ve got no union. And if they don’t smile, they don’t get to keep their jobs. You get paid in “cool bucks,” not a living wage.

There has always been a resistance to organizing, especially with “hip” managers smoking out with you in the produce cooler, or giving you mushrooms for your birthday, or farmers laying some nice green and red buds on you around Christmastime. (Not that I’d know anything about that.)

But now we have Whole Foods, which is no different from Safeway, really, in terms of business model. Except they conveniently don’t have to deal with an organized work force. How nice for them and how sad for the workers, who have to put up with all the bullshit of a Fred Meyer worker, without the benefits, protections and guarantees of a union contract.

Mike, you’re right about higher prices at independent co-ops. But not at Whole Foods and New Seasons.

Also, I’m pretty sure the Wobblies were among the unions looked at a decade ago when Food Front workers were first organizing. I know we talked about the IWW during the Nature’s union campaign, but the bottom line is you get what you pay for.

At Nature’s we were dealing with GNC (yes, that GNC), and it sure helped to know an 18,000 strong union was at my back. They gave me free legal representation, filed (and won) and unfair labor practices complaint with the National Labor Relations Board (boy was my boss surprised when I showed him my subpoena to testify).

The Wobblies might have been a better choice for Food Front, I’ll grant you, but for Nature’s, it had to be someone like UFCW or the Teamsters to get their attention and keep them within the law.