The UFCW Union, Tesco's Fresh & Easy, U.S. Labor Relations, and Next Week's Presidential and Congressional Election

As our regular readers are aware, Fresh & Easy Buzz has been reporting on, writing about and analyzing the United Food & Commercial Workers (UFCW) union's efforts to unionize Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store-level employees throughout this year. We've broken news on the issue and have been one of the few publications of any kind to cover the UFCW-Fresh & Easy issue comprehensively.

We've particularly been surprised the California mainstream business and political press has not reported more on the issue to date.

The main reason we're surprised more ink hasn't been devoted to the UFCW-Fresh & Easy unionization story by the mainstream press, especially in California where the company is based, is because labor issues are a key aspect of the current race for U.S. President.

It's not that labor issues are an important campaign talking point. They aren't. In fact labor issues are seldom brought up by either Democratic candidate Barack Obama or Republican candidate John McCain.

Rather, what is important is that Obama and McCain have very different opinions and positions on the Employee Free Choice Act. This piece of legislation, which passed by a majority vote last year in the U.S. House of Representatives and was defeated in the U.S. Senate by just a couple votes, would dramatically change the way labor unions are able to organize workers and how workers are able to choose union representation.

Senator Obama says is for the Employee Free Choice Act. Senator McCain says he is against it.

Under the act, workers would be able to select union membership by checking a box on a card rather than going through the secret ballot voting method which has been a part of U.S. labor law for decades. This is called the "card check system." If the majority of workers, say at a Fresh & Easy grocery store, checked "yes" on the card, that they want union representation, that would be sufficient to be recognized by the company as a union shop under the provisions of the legislation.

Those in favor of the Employee Free Choice Act, which in 2007 was a majority of U.S. House of Representative members and a near-majority of U.S. Senators (including some Republicans in both branches), say it's a more fair system for workers than the current secret ballot system.

Those against the act argue the "card check" aspect isn't fair because workers then aren't able to cast their votes in secret.

President George W. Bush is against the measure, so even if it would have passed the U.S. Senate last year, he had promised a veto.

Senator Obama has said if elected President he will sign a bill passed by Congress authorizing the Employee Free Choice Act.

Senator McCain has said he opposes the act. However, he hasn't gone as far as to say he would not sign the bill if passed by a majority in both houses of Congress. Many think if elected President he might sign such a bill as part of his history of reaching across the aisle, even though he says he currently is against the change from the secret ballot voting method.

Additionally, if the polls are right today, just eight days from the November 4 election, the Democratic Party looks to be set to pick up numerous new seats in the House and Senate. Of particular interest to those who support the Employee Free Choice Act is the Senate. If the Democrats were to pick up enough seats in the November 4 election to have a majority of 60 members, they would be able to pass any legislation such as the Employee Free Choice Act in a veto-proof way. The magic number to avoid a filibuster in the U.S. Senate is 60 votes.

All the Democrats need though are two or three additional votes to pass the Employee Free Choice Act in the next legislative session, based on last years vote count. Even the most conservative estimates have the Democrats picking up at least five or six new Senate seats in the November 4 election. That would give them more than enough extra votes to pass the Employee Free Choice Act with a non veto-proof majority next year.

If Senator Obama wins he has indicated he will sign the legislation. If Senator McCain wins it is far from certain if he really would veto the Employee Free Choice Act, since if the Democrats have a huge majority in both the House and Senate, which today's polls suggest will happen, he would have to pick his fights -- and the bills he decides to veto -- very carefully since without the support of the Democratic majority in Congress he would be unable to get much if anything done during his first term as President.

It's against this backdrop -- that Fresh & Easy Buzz has been extensively covering the UFCW-Fresh & Easy unionization issue, and that U.S. labor policy could be in for a major shift as a result of the November 4 Presidential and Congressional election, even if Senator McCain wins the Presidency -- that we're pleased to see the Los Angeles Times run a story in this morning's addition on the UFCW campaign to unionize Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store-level employees.

The piece, by staff writer Jerry Hirsch, doesn't cover a lot of new ground in terms of what we've been reporting this year on the issue. However, it does discuss in interesting detail what is a new confidence within the UFCW about its chances to unionize Fresh & Easy and other non-union food and grocery retailing chains, which is something we've noted in our reporting as well. It also offers a number of additional insights.

Read the story, "A revived grocery union aims at Fresh & Easy," here.

We should note that in our extensive reporting, which has included talking with many Fresh & Easy store-level workers, there is far from unanimous agreement among the employees about joining the UFCW union.

As we reported here on September 17, the employees of the Fresh & Easy store in Huntington Beach, California petitioned Tesco Fresh & Easy for union representation. The company denied the petition, as we reported on October 2, telling the employees to hold a vote on the issue per current U.S. Labor Law policy, using the secret ballot system. The store employees and the UFCW have been discussing doing just that. A vote among the store's workers has yet to be scheduled.

Additionally, we reported in this September 26 piece, employees of at least two other Fresh & Easy stores had been debating petitioning the company for union representation like the Huntington Beach store workers did. However, according to our sources, those employees have decided not to do so since seeing the response from the company in which they denied the Huntington Beach store employees request (which we predicted would be the case).

The workers at these two additional Fresh & Easy stores are thinking more along the lines of having a direct vote since they know that would be what the company tells them to do if they were to request UFCW representation via a letter, which is what the Huntington Beach store employees did.

But chain-wide it is a mixed bag among the many store workers we've talked with. Some want union representation, others are very much against it, and still others (the majority of those we've talked with) don't have much of an opinion on it one way or the other.

We've seen a similar pattern with Whole Foods Market, Inc. store-level employees who the UFCW has tried to unionize for years. There is a small core of Whole Foods store workers who want the union, a core of employees who are completely against it, and a middle -- those who are non opinionated about the issue and therefore have tended to side with the group that is against unionization. This group is sort of like the "undecided" in an election. They need to be persuaded. In the Whole Foods' case the company has been able to persuade them to oppose unionization.

However, the UFCW has gotten much farther, much faster with its Tesco Fresh & Easy campaign that it has with Whole Foods, for example. After all, the Huntington Beach store has been open less than a year and the employees have already requested union representation.

And of course, come next year when a new President takes power, particularly if it is Barack Obama, along with a Democratic majority in the Senate if that happens, which is likely, we predict the Employee Free Choice Act will be passed by both houses of Congress and then signed by a President Barack Obama -- and perhaps even by a Maverick President John McCain if he pulls it out and is elected on November 4. After all, Mavericks call themselves that because they do the unexpected; right?

This would mean the UFCW and other labor unions would have a much easier time organizing Fresh & Easy store and others employees. The workers would need only to check a "yes" or "no" on the "quick check card" to vote on whether or not they want union representation.

This explains to a large degree the renewed optimism expressed by the UFCW in today's Los Angeles Times story. It also explains in part why American organized labor is out working in full force nationally to elect Senator Obama and more Democrats to Congress.

Tens of thousands of union members are working in grass roots efforts across the U.S. for the Obama campaign, as well as donating more money to Senator Obama than they have to any other candidate for President in modern times. In fact, although "Joe the Plumber," who we were sad to find out isn't actually a licensed plumber, has decided to hit the campaign trail for Senator McCain, we are told by organized labor there are at least a couple hundred licensed, union plumbers campaigning for Senator Obama. We suspect at least one has to be named Joe.

The current U.S. fiscal crisis and resulting economic recession is dominating the current Presidential campaign, as it should be. However, labor relations and how labor policy will play out in the future is a near silent but very important aspect of this year's election. It's also related to the fiscal crisis and economic recession -- big time.

As such, labor issues, including the UFCW-Fresh & Easy situation, should be receiving much more attention and coverage than they have been this year. We are doing our part by focusing on what just happens to be one of the hottest labor issues directly on our beat.

[Editor's note: Click here and here and here for a selection from Fresh & Easy Buzz of past reporting, writings and analysis on the UFCW-Fresh & Easy issue.]

UNI Global Union Launches Tesco-Specific Alliance; Calls For Tesco Executives to Meet With UFCW Union Officials Over Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market

The Nyon, Switzerland-based UNI Global Union has launched what it's calling The UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance, which it says is designed to "develop constructive labor relations with Tesco PLC, parent company of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA, and to become a recognized and constructive social partner with Tesco to promote the well being of the company's workforce" around the world.

UNI is a global union for skills and services with 15 million members worldwide. It has about 1,000 member-unions located in countries throughout the world. Members of UNI global include the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) union, which represents about 1.3 million retail supermarket clerks and workers in related positions in the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico.

As we've reported on and written about extensively, the UFCW is conducting an aggressive multi-front campaign in the U.S. and UK designed to get Tesco senior executives to meet with union officials to discuss the issue of unionizing its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store-level workers in the U.S. states of California, Nevada and Arizona, where the retailer's current 67 Fresh and Easy small-format grocery stores are located.

According to Philip J. Jennings, General Secretary of the UNI Global Union, the UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance, which was formed on June 18, plans to grow union representation in Tesco in all of the countries it operates stores in globally. Those countries include: The United Kingdom, Ireland, Hungary, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Turkey, China, Japan, Malaysia, Thailand, South Korea and the United States (Fresh & Easy).

The UNI Global Union says it has affiliate unions (among its 1,000 members) that represent workers in "the commerce sector" an all of the above countries, with the exception of Communist controlled China, where it has a relationship with the government controlled Commercial Workers Union.

UNI Global Union-head Jennings says a key focus of the alliance is to get Tesco PLC executives to meet with officials of the U.S.-based UFCW union to discuss the unionization of the retailer's Fresh & Easy grocery stores in the Western U.S.

Jennings says a dialogue between Tesco and UFCW officials is the way to go forward, saying the UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance plans to help the UFCW break what he calls the "deadlock" between the union and Tesco.

"The UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance calls upon Tesco to enter into a dialogue with the UFCW union," which is an affiliate of the global union group, "in the United States," Jennings said in a statement on June 18 in announcing the formation of the Tesco-specific global union alliance.

Additionally, he says: "European companies should not adopt double standards on labor issues when they go overseas," referring to the fact that Tesco's European stores are unionized, while its Fresh & Easy grocery stores in the U.S. aren't.

As a part of its charter, the new Tesco-specific global union alliance says it wants to "enter into a constructive dialogue with Tesco PLC to find mutually beneficial solutions to promote the business success of the company along with the interests of its workers."

Among its chief concerns, the global union alliance says, is recognition of trade unions by Tesco in a number of the countries it does business in, including in the U.S. with Fresh & Easy.

While it seems the intent of the new UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance is to have an ongoing dialogue with Tesco on a global basis, its goal of increasing union membership within Tesco divisions throughout the world, especially in the U.S., could be a non-starter as far as Tesco is concerned.

Regarding its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA division, which is currently Tesco's fastest-growing globally in terms of the number of new stores being opened, as we've reported, the retailer maintains its ongoing position that it sees no need or has no desire to meet with officials of the UFCW union to discuss unionization issues.

Further, Tesco PLC CEO Terry Leahy and Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA CEO Tim Mason, have both said on more than one occasion the company's position is that the UFCW is free to organize Fresh & Easy store-level employees in California, Nevada and Arizona in accordance with U.S. federal labor laws, and that it is the workers' choice as to whether or not they want to join the union via a secret ballot election.

Tesco has been firm on this position. Therefore, since one of the primary focuses of the UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance is to get Tesco officials to meet with UFCW leaders, which also is the purpose of the extensive UFCW union's campaign, and Tesco's position remains unchanged in terms of saying it sees no need or purpose of such a meeting, we see essentially a stalemate in terms of much progress being made between the global union alliance and Tesco on a variety of issues.

Additionally, although about 1,000 global unions are members of UNI Global, each has its own priorities and focuses. As we know from alliances such as the United Nations and the European Union, reaching consensus on a global basis isn't the easiest thing to do for any organization.

Therefore, we will watch closely to see if the larger, global desires (especially as it pertains to Europe) of the alliance's relations with Tesco, combined with the UFCW union's more immediate goals vis-a-vis Tesco's Fresh & Easy in the U.S., result in more cooperation between the union affiliation, end up resulting in a competitive position, or merely are rendered not all that affective because of the difficulty of balancing global union policies with more immediate local union priorities.

The formation of the UNI Tesco Global Union Alliance, and its support of a meeting between UFCW officials and Tesco executives does however add an additional element to the UFCW's Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market campaign.

As a result of this continuing pressure on Tesco's Fresh & Easy, which is struggling in a number of ways without the union issue, Tesco could decide to sit down with the union leaders for a meeting in order to take some of the heat off. This could be especially true if the UFCW and its union coalition partners are able to garner significant consumer support for the issue, which has yet to happen in our analysis.

After all, major U.S. food and grocery retailers like Wal-Mart, Inc., Whole Foods Market, Inc., and Trader Joe's have been able to prevent unionization of their respective chains by the UFCW for decades, with no sign of that situation changing any time soon.

Additionally, there are a number of fast growing chains such as the natural foods retailers Sprouts Farmers Market, Sunflower Farmers Market and Henry's Farmers Market, all which are based in the U.S. West like Tesco's Fresh & Easy is, that are non-union.

These two combined facts allow Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market to point out it's far from the only and far from the largest U.S. grocery chain to be non-union. Wal-Mart, Whole Foods and Trader Joe's for example all have far more stores and do far more in annual sales currently than Fresh & Easy does.

Tesco is the world's third largest retailer after France's Carrefour and Wal-Mart, Inc. Therefore, like Wal-Mart, despite the size of its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA at present, it's a global giant and therefore will continue to be a focus of labor unions, especially the UFCW in the U.S. That much we can guarantee.

UFCW Union Flyers On His Door Knob Cause Heat in 'The Pragmatic Chef's' Mental Kitchen; Others Wondering About the Negative Campaign As Well

Blogger the 'pragmatic chef' arrived home last night to find a couple of the United Food and Commercial Workers union's (UFCW) "Fresh & Easy Facts" and "Don't Be Fooled By Fresh & Easy" anti-Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market flyers on his front door knob.

As we've reported in Fresh & Easy Buzz, the UFCW is doing flyer drops in neighborhoods like 'the pragmatic chef's' where Tesco is getting ready to open new Fresh & Easy small-format combination basic grocery and fresh foods markets. Tesco is doing lots of new store openings at present--it's opening about 30 new Fresh & Easy grocery stores in the next 90 days.

Although he says he is a longtime union man, the pragmatic chef says finding the UFCW's flyers--and then reading them--created a little heat in his mental kitchen, leading him to rant about it today in his blog.

Read 'the pragmatic chef's' take on the UFCW flyers and what he thinks about the content here.

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA is a non-union food and grocery retailing chain, unlike Tesco in the United Kingdom where the company is based, which is union- affiliated.

The major chain grocers--Safeway Stores (Vons banner), Kroger Co. (Ralphs supermarkets), SuperValu (Albertsons), Bashas and others, including most regional chains and larger independent grocers--in Southern California, Nevada and Arizona where Tesco's Fresh & Easy grocery stores are located are UFCW-represented union shops.

Trader Joe's, Whole Foods Market, Sprouts Farmers Markets, Wal-Mart, Costco and a few others in these three states are, like Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, non-union shops.

The UFCW is conducting a grass roots and media campaign both in the Western U.S. states of California, Nevada and Arizona, as well as in Tesco's home country the United Kingdom where the international retailer has its headquarters, which is designed to get Tesco executives to meet with union leaders to discuss unionizing Fresh & Easy store-level employees.

Thus far Tesco has declined to meet with the UFCW union's leaders, saying its position is that the UFCW is free to organize the Fresh & Easy store workers within the guidelines of U.S. labor laws, adding that it is up to the store employees if they choose to join the union.

We've suggested recently in a couple of stories in the blog (see links at bottom) that the UFCW might want to take a page from Barack Obama (who has pledged to run a positive campaign for President against Republican John McCain), the candidate it's supporting for U.S. President, and rather than using the negative tactics it is in the anti-Tesco Fresh & Easy Flyers, focus more on the positive features, of which there are many, that Fresh & Easy store-level workers could gain from affiliating with the UFCW.

We suggested this because we have heard from Fresh & Easy store employers, consumers and others that they, like the Pragmatic Chef, find the negative UFCW campaign repugnant.

In fact, we've even talked to executives of two unionized supermarket chains who told Fresh & Easy Buzz they don't like the negative food safety focus of the UFCW flyers, telling us they fear that message could potentially cause erosion on the part of some consumers in the retail supermarket industry's food safety record and abilities.

Both industry executives, who work for supermarket chains that have UFCW unionized store-level workers, also told us they didn't think the union's flyer campaign was very successful to date in getting Tesco to the table for a meeting, which is the UFCW's stated goal of its overall campaign.

Related Posts in Fresh & Easy Buzz:

June 30, 2008: Breaking News: UFCW Union Launches Preemptive Anti-Tesco Fresh & Easy Brochure Distribution Drop on the Eve of Manhattan Beach Store Grand Opening

July 4, 2008: Breaking News: UFCW Union Strikes Again With Anti-Tesco Fresh & Easy Brochure Drop in Neighborhood Surrounding New Manhattan Beach Store

July 2, 2008: UFCW Union Pickets Out in Force This Morning At Manhattan Beach Fresh & Easy Store Grand Opening

June 26, 2008: Tesco 2008 AGM: Barack Obama Sends Second Letter to Tesco CEO Requesting the Company Meet With U.S. UFCW Union Leaders About Fresh & Easy

July 3, 2008: Mid-Week Fresh & Easy Roundup: Fresh & Easy Gets Caught in A Land Use Dispute; Those Near-Famous Mixed Grill Packs; More On Manhattan Beach

March 26, 2008: United Food and Commercial Workers Union Begins its Spring 2008 Organizing and Communications Campaign Directed at Tesco's Fresh & Easy

July 16, 2008: Fresh Feature: A Former NBA All-Star Who Wants to Become Mayor, A Trade Union, And A Future Tesco Fresh & Easy Grocery Store In Sacramento, California

February 11, 2008: Supermarket Union President Asks Britain's Prince Andrew to Arrange A 'Sit-Down' With Tesco Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market Senior Executives

June 4, 2008: News and Analysis: UFCW Union Takes its Tesco Union Organizing Campaign Across the Pond to the United Kingdom Beginning Today

December 30, 2007: UFCW Union to Organize Fresh & Easy Clerks in 2008

News and Analysis: UFCW Union Takes its Tesco Union Organizing Campaign Across the Pond to the United Kingdom Beginning Today

The United Food and Commercial Workers Union (UFCW), the union for unionized retail food store clerks employed at union supermarkets in the United States, has taken its organizing campaign against Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market USA across the pond to the retailer's home country of the United Kingdom.

As we've regularly reported in Fresh & Easy Buzz, the UFCW has been attempting to unionize store-level employees at Tesco's Fresh & Easy grocery stores in Southern California, Arizona and Nevada since shortly after the first of the current 61 small-format, convenience-oriented grocery markets opened in late October, 2007.

To date, the union's organizing campaign has been on U.S. soil, in Southern California, the Phoenix Metropolitan region in Arizona and in the Las Vegas, Nevada Metropolitan area, where Tesco has its stores.

The UFCW organizing campaign to date has primarily consisted of a media relations campaign attempting to get stories published in the press about its efforts to organize Fresh & Easy employees and what it says is Tesco's "anti-union" position regarding Fresh & Easy, placing informational pickets outside the Fresh & Easy grocery stores, and leafleting neighborhoods where Fresh & Easy stores are located with flyers, including those with text describing two past situations where Tesco in the UK was caught selling out of date perishable foods and foods labeled "organic" that turned out to not be organic. Tesco settled both of those claims with UK government regulatory authorities.

However, as we were the first--and as far as we can find only publication--to report here, the UFCW had planned to intensify its union organizing campaign against Tesco beginning this summer.

UFCW's 'The Two Faces of Tesco' UK campaign

Today, the UFCW began the first phase of its more aggressive organization effort by launching what it calls its "The Two Faces of Tesco" campaign in the international retailer's backyard, in the UK.

A major thrust of the UFCW's UK campaign is to draw attention to what it says is Tesco's close relationship in the UK with labor unions, including USDAW, which represents workers in Tesco UK supermarkets.

Emily Steward, a campaign director, says Tesco's close relationship and cooperation with Britain's labor unions hasn't been replicated across the pond in the U.S. with its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market division. In fact, she argues Tesco is fighting any form of union representation in its Fresh & Easy grocery stores in the USA. (Hence the "two faces.")

"Tesco has a great reputation for employment rights and corporate responsibility in the UK, but this is sullied by its behavior in the US," Steward says.

Tesco says it isn't true the company is anti-union in the U.S. at its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market division. Fresh & Easy CEO Tim Mason has said the retailer's position is that store level workers have the right under U.S. laws to organize and to join a union if they choose to. In other words, it is up to them, according to Tesco's official position.

U.S. federal labor laws allow unions to organize store-level workers, and for companies to oppose such organization, as long as both parties follow a set of guidlines in doing so. Under these laws, employers can't prevent employees from talking with union representatives, organizing, and gathering signatures on a petition calling for union representation. If the appropriate number of signatures are gathered on the petition, and various procedures followed, the employees than can vote on union representation.

The U.S. labor laws offer lots of "wiggle room" for both sides in them though.

The law does allow employers to work against union representation in a variety of ways, including meeting with employees and encouraging them not to form a union, as well as using other techniques at their disposal to stop unions from forming at their stores.

One of these techniques, which has become popular in the U.S., is for companies to hire consulting firms which specialize in persuading employees not to join a union. Many of these firms are owned by former union organizers. What these firms do is legal under U.S. laws as long as they don't violate the laws.

In fact, last week Fresh & Easy Buzz received a solicitation email, either intentionally or unintentionally, from one such popular U.S. firm.

Below is the solicitation email we received on May 27:

UFCW Fresh and Easy Corporate Campaign Tuesday, May 27, 2008 9:06pm

From: "Walter Orechwa"

To: freshneasybuzz@yahoo.com

To Whom it may concern,

Please forward to management, HR or the Labor Relations group.

Projections, Inc. can assist Fresh and Easy in remaining Union Free and battling this corporate campaign. Check us out at http://www.projectionsinc.com/ for more information.

Best of luck, Walter Orechwa

Chief Executive Officer

Projections, Inc.

Award-winning Employee Communications

877-448-9741 Ext. 213

Web: http://www.projectionsinc.com/

Blog: http://www.employeecentric.blogspot.com/

Since Fresh & Easy Buzz has a very long and complete description on the front page of the blog explaining the publication is independent and has nothing to do with Tesco or any competitors, we have no idea why we received the solicitation, unless the firm, which is perfectly above board in doing such a solicitation, wanted us to know about it and what it's up to for publicity reasons. If that's the case, I guess it worked; at least sort of.

Fresh & Easy Buzz has no idea if this firm has talked to Tesco to date. We doubt it though, based on the May 27 email to the blog. Additionally, to our knowledge, Tesco currently has no such firm employes to deal with the UFCW labor and unionization issue.

What the UFCW says it wants

According to UFCW campaign director Emily Stewart, what the union wants at present is to enter into a dialogue with Tesco about potential union representation for its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market store-level workers. She says the union has no specific demands at this point in time.

The majority of chain and independent supermarkets in California, Arizona and Nevada are union stores. This includes Safeway Stores, Inc.'s Vons' and Safeway banner operations in California, Arizona and Nevada, Kroger Co.'s Ralph's chain, SuperValue, Inc.'s Albertsons and Bristol Farms chains in the markets, Bashas in Arizona, Raley's in California and Nevada, and others, including most multi-store and large single-store independents

There are other major non-union food retailers in the market regions besides Tesco's Fresh & Easy. These include Wal-Mart, the largest retailer in the world and in the U.S., Whole Foods Market, Trader Joe's and Sprouts Farmers Markets, all with numerous stores in one or more of the three states where Tesco currently operates its 61 Fresh & Easy grocery stores.

British MP part of UFCW UK campaign

The UFCW has recruited a member of Britain's Parliament, MP John Cruddas, to help lead the union's campaign against Tesco in the UK.

MP Cruddas spoke at the campaign's launch today in the UK, voicing his support for the UFCW's union organizing of Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market employees in the U.S.

“British companies which operate in the global marketplace should apply the highest standards in dealing with their workforce, both at home and abroad. What this dossier exposes about Tesco’s practices in the United States, in my view not only undermines Tesco’s reputation, but will also affect how people think about the fairness of British companies in general. I urge Tesco to put its stated principles and policies into practice and to start talking to these important stakeholders,” MP Gruddas said at today's UK campaign launch.

MP Cruddas also said today he plans to write a letter to Tesco PLC CEO Sir Terry Leahy, in it urging him to meet with UFCW officials. The MP also said he plans to lobby his fellow members of Parliament to join him in supporting the union's efforts to get Tesco to sit down and discuss the unionization issue with them.

At the campaign launch, the UFCW's Stewart said: “We (the UFCW) were genuinely excited at the prospect of building a partnership with Tesco (Fresh & Easy in the U.S.), so we are doubly appalled at the way it is behaving towards us and the many community groups which have tried and failed to meet with it.

“Our dossier exposes Tesco’s two faces, and we intend to campaign in Britain to show Tesco’s other face to British people, British investors and British politicians, in the hope that they will influence Tesco to stop and think again about how they conduct their business in America. We are asking for nothing more than Tesco already does here.”

The retail food store clerks' union has been attempting to meet with Tesco executives for about two years, since the retailer announced its plans to open the Fresh & Easy grocery stores in the U.S. Thus far however, Tesco PLC CEO Sir Terry Leahy has refused to meet with UFCW representatives or to have Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market CEO Tim Mason, or any other members of the corporate executive team, meet with the leaders of the union.

Tesco hasn't publicly criticized or fought back against the UFCW's campaign to unionize Fresh & Easy store workers though. In fact, the retailer has essentially ignored the union and its effort publicly. Rather than fight back against some of the union's charges in the press, for example, all Tesco has stated publicly is that its position is that it's up to the retailer's workers to decide if they want to join the union.

California union cashier joins in UK campaign launch

Jackie Gitmead, a store cashier at Ralph's supermarket in Encino, in Southern California, attended today's launch along with British MP Cruddas, the union's Emily Stewart, and other supporters and campaign organizers.

“We’re never going to be rich working for a grocery store, but we all deserve a shot at earning a living wage and health insurance we can afford, as well as the peace of mind to know that we won’t be let go at a moment’s notice, Ralph's cashier Gitmead, who says she has been a union retail clerk for 32 years, said today in the UK.

“In my 32 years working with the protection of a union agreement, I have enjoyed job security and union-negotiated healthcare and pensions benefits. Our colleagues at Tesco’s Fresh & Easy stores don’t have this. I have flown from LA to London because this campaign is important. I hope it will make Tesco pay attention, so that my fellow workers in Tesco’s US stores can enjoy the benefits and opportunities they deserve.”

Kroger Co.-owned Ralph's, a unionized food retailer, is the leading supermarket chain in Southern California, along with Safeway Stores, Inc's Vons' divsion, which also is a 100% union shop.

State of the union movement in the U.S.

The UFCW currently has 1.3 million worker-members in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. The majority of those 1.3 million members of the union work in retail food and grocery stores. However, some also work in the related food processing and meat-packing industry.

The U.S. supermarket industry, like the U.S auto industry, is one of the few remaining majority-union industries in the United States. Nearly all of the country's top food and grocery chains are unionized. Additionally, in states like California, even most multi and single-store independent grocers are unionized, their employees being members of the UFCW.

Tesco has not issued a comment on the UFCW's "The Two Faces of Tesco" UK campaign at press time.

Intensified campaign comes at bad time for Tesco in U.S.

The energized campaign by the UFCW--both in the U.S. and now across the pond in the UK--comes at a bad time for Tesco's Fresh & Easy venture in the U.S.

The grocer is two-thirds the way thorough a three month new store opening pause which began in April and ends at the end on July 2, when the first new store in three months opens in Manhattan Beach, in Southern California.

After that opening, Fresh & Easy returns to a planned new store opening frenzy, like it has been doing since the first store opened in Hemet, (Southern) California in late October, 2007. Between November and April, 2007, Tesco opened 61 of its small-format, convenience-oriented Fresh & Easy grocery stores, which amounts to opening a new store about every three days during that time period.

The retailer's new store opening schedule starting on July 2 and for the remainder of the year and into 2009 will be at about the same pace. In addition to opening numerous new stores in its existing Southern California, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada markets (including 10 new stores in the Las Vegas region that are currently being remodeled for opening fairly soon), Tesco plans to enter the Northern California Market, opening Fresh & Easy stores in the Central Valley cities of Bakersfield (5 stores so far), Fresno (5 stores so far) and Modesto (1 store so far) ; along with opening 19 initial stores in the Sacramento Metropolitan region, and 20 stores in the San Francisco Bay Area. (18 of those Bay Area stores are confirmed by Tesco, two we just reported on last week here.)

Tesco's Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market has been using its three month new store opening pause thus far to try to improve the operations, merchandising and marketing of its existing 61 stores, including attempting to bring in more new customers and increase sales and market basket size. That effort--although in fairness it's only 60 days old--has been a mixed success in our analysis, with very little especially done in the improved merchandising and marketing areas.

The retailer has recently announced its adding 250 new items to the stores, along with introducing an improved design package which thus far has been installed in its Laguna Hills market in Southern California, and is being rolled out to all of the chain's other stores--which is most of them to date--that are housed in remodeled retail buildings

The new interior package, which includes some brighter colors, a couple wall murals and increased and improved directional and product signage, is an improvement over what the original store interiors look like. As we've written about often--and as numerous Fresh & Easy customers have told the retailer--the stores have a sterile look, and in our words lack a "sense of place" to them.

Tesco hopes the new interior enhancements will solve that problem. There has been some positive consumer response to the improvements at the Laguna Hills store, according to employees and shoppers of the store we've talked with. However, the jury is still obviously out on the store interior improvements, which are fairly minor in scope.

A former Tesco Fresh & Easy employee who worked at the headquarters office in Southern California recently told Fresh & Easy Buzz "chaos" was a good word to describe the environment at HQ since the first stores opened late last year. The former employee also said it seemed it was impossible to focus on operational and merchandising issues and improvements because the rapid new store opening pace was consuming the majority of everyone's time in the office.

Adding the UFCW's intensified union organizing campaign--including its now cross-Atlantic efforts--to this chaotic mix could be difficult for Tesco and its Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Market, which already is juggling many balls in the air with the fledgling retail venture.

As we reported some time ago, the union also has plans to intensify its current unionization campaign efforts regarding Fresh & Easy in the U.S., including using more aggressive grass- roots tactics, along with an increased media relations program, as well as getting more U.S. political leaders to join in its efforts.

As we reported here, the UFCW was able to get then candidate now Democratic nominee for President of the United States Barack Obama, who the union is supporting, to send Tesco a letter asking it to meet with union officials about the unionization issue. Before that, the UFCW got then Democratic candidate, who it supported before he dropped out of the race, to send a similar letter to Tesco.

We can report the union is working on other national political leaders to do the same, including those from the states of California, Nevada and Arizona, where Tesco currently has its 61 Fresh & Easy grocery stores.

Meanwhile, Tesco has said it has no objection to the UFCW or any other union organizing store-level workers per U.S. federal labor law. Tesco's strategy towards the UFCW can be described as one of "benign neglect" in many ways.

However, those efforts by the union, happered they say by Tesco, haven't seemed to get anywhere for the UFCW since it started them late last year, dsepite the fact Fresh & Easy store workers only make $10 hour and are part time even if they choose to be full time, which isn't an option with the exception of the store manager and assisant manager.

By comparison, an entry-level retail clerk at a union supermarket like Safeway or Ralph's in California, starts out at about $13 - $14 an hour, and after one year for full time workers makes close to $20 hour. Part time workers working 20 hours a week take about two years to reach that level. Both full time and part time union supermarket workers get a raise about every three (for full time) to six (part timers) months until they reach that journylevel status and the nearly $20 an hour wage-level.

The retail food store clerk's union benefits also are among the best of any industry in the United States, with below average co-payments, and extremely reasonable employee contributions for dental, vision and mental health insurance coverage, which is available along with medical. For example, an executive at Safeway recently told us the retail clerk union health insurance is better than his corparate coverage, as well as having lower co-pays.

The union, through member dues and employer contributions, also has a retirement pension plan for workers. A union member with about 30 years service as a supermarket retail clerk can take home about $40,000 annually in retirement benefits after those three decades of sevice. This is in addition to collecting Social Security benefits thorugh the U.S. government program.

Most publicly-owned unionized U.S. grocery chains like Safeway, SuperValu, Kroger (the top three) and others also offer employees the ability to buy stock in the company at a substantial discounted share price. Some also have employee profit-sharing programs which the retailer contributeds to each year, as do many privately held U.S. unionized supermarket companies.

Summer sizzler

Its only June, and summer is just beginning.

Like the summer weather, which doesn't start getting really hot until about July 1 in most parts of California (San Francisco aside), Nevada and Arizona, the union issue between the UFCW and Tesco is also only just beginning to heat up. The union's campaign, both in the U.S. and now in the UK, will start to heat up even more as the summer progresses. Stay tuned.

You can download the UFCW's report, or dossier, "The Two Faces of Tesco," which is mentioned in our piece here. The report compares how Tesco does business at home in the UK versus how it does business in the U.S., according to the UFCW union.

Tesco had no response at press time to the UFCW report or launch today of its campaign in the United Kingdom. If and when Tesco has a response, Fresh & Easy Buzz will report on it and write about it.