Strike Wears on Pickets’ Morale at Supermarkets

At the beginning of the third week of the meat cutters’ strike, the picket lines were depleted and downbeat.

Outside several San Fernando Valley supermarkets, strikers complained of feeling strained and discouraged Monday. At some markets there were only two or three pickets still on duty by afternoon.

Bundled against a chilly wind, they chatted among themselves, debating the significance of rumors and speculating on their futures.

“Sorry we’re so depressed today,” said meat cutter Carol Matousek, 40, who wore a scarf and gloves as she sat on a bench outside the Vons market at Reseda Boulevard and Nordhoff Street in Northridge. “We usually have more energy.”

Matousek had heard that the strike might go on until after Christmas. She said she wasn’t prepared for that.

‘We All Want to Work’

“No, I want to work,” she said.

“We all want to work,” said her only picketing partner, Hector Morales, 40, who sat beside her.

At the Vons market at Winnetka Avenue and Roscoe Boulevard in Winnetka, Barry Rado, 35, said he had heard that the strike could end as early as Dec. 1.

But even that date seemed distant to him. Rado said he was receiving $150 a week from the union strike fund in place of his meat cutters’ salary of $550 a week.

“Hopefully, we’ll get our jobs back,” he said. “By now, that’s about all we want to do is get our jobs back. After a week, you start to get concerned. After a couple, you start to get scared.”

Rado and five others picketing with him had all worked together in that market before the strike. He said a few friendly customers were informing them that the meat supply inside was suffering.

On Monday the store had a selection that included round tip roast, chuck steak, top sirloin, round steak, T-bone steak, New York steak and rib eye steak.

Rado said the thought that the strike might be driving customers away bothered him. If the store lost customers because of the strike, it would have less work for them after the strike, he said.

“The amount of people employed in the store depends on the volume we do,” he said.

“We’re between a rock and a hard place,” another picket said.

Proposed Changes Caused Strike

The meat cutters, members of the United Food and Commercial Workers, struck the Vons chain over proposed changes in their contract that spokesmen for the supermarket industry contend are necessary to keep up with stiffening competition.

The markets want to create a new, lower-paid position of meat clerk to work under meat cutters. They are also trying to eliminate the clause in the contract that guarantees meat cutters 40 hours of work a week.

When the union struck Vons, and was joined by the Teamsters, other markets locked out their employees who belong to the two unions.

Meat cutters from all the markets joined to sustain the picket line outside Vons. By Monday, though, their ranks were dwindling and many pickets said they have received little information about how the negotiations are going.

Rado, however, said he had heard that union leaders were ready to accept the new meat clerk job classification.

Industry Is Changing

“We know the industry is going to change,” he said.

He seemed resigned to it.

“I think everybody’s pretty much to the point that, if they were saying: ‘Go back to work,’ no matter what it is, they’d do it,” he said.

“Except the 40-hour week,” another picket interjected.

They all agreed they couldn’t go back without that.