Sam’s Club Workers Turn Down Teamsters : Labor: The union loses its bid to crack discount giant Wal-Mart. Workers at the Fullerton store vote 3 to 1 against unionizing.
Workers at the Sam’s Club here voted Friday against joining the Teamsters union, soundly defeating organized labor’s first bid in Southern California to penetrate discount giant Wal-Mart.
Employees at the food and merchandise warehouse voted 92 to 30 against Teamsters Local 952 in Orange. About 150 warehouse and clerical workers at the Fullerton store, a former Pace membership warehouse that Wal-Mart bought from K mart Corp. last year, were eligible to cast ballots.
The vote was a setback to the Southland labor movement. Unions including the Teamsters have long dominated the region’s food and warehouse industry, but in recent years they have felt mounting pressure from large, non-union retailers like Wal-Mart, which are bidding for a greater share of the lucrative Southern California market.
For organized labor, a victory at the Fullerton Sam’s Club would have been all the more significant because it would have given unions a toehold at the nation’s largest retailer. The Arkansas-based company, which has had a contentious relationship with unions, owns more than 2,300 Wal-Marts and 430 Sam’s Club membership stores nationwide. None of those is under a union contract.
About 40 employees and managers crowded into a small training room near the store’s check-out stands to witness the ballot count. Union organizers stood with their arms crossed, shaking their heads slowly as one “no” vote after another was read by federal labor officials.
Leaders of Local 952 expressed disappointment and some dismay over the outcome. The 12,000-member union, one of the largest in Orange County, had put considerable resources in a six-month campaign.
Two months ago, when the union filed for a union election, organizers said they had signature cards of support from a majority of the workers, some of whom complained that when Wal-Mart bought the store from K mart last year, the company reduced vacation, holiday and sick-pay benefits.
In the past week, union members made a flurry of calls and house visits.
“We’re going to go forward,” said Patrick Kelly, one of the union organizers. He blamed the loss on what he called an aggressive campaign by Wal-Mart. Kelly and workers said that the company, with the help of managers from Arkansas, had frequent meetings at the Fullerton store, passing out leaflets and playing videos portraying Teamsters’ past connections to organized crime.
“We were hoping it would be closer,” Kelly said of the vote. “It shows we need to intensify our efforts to organize these groups.”
However, those who had voted against the union were jubilant, hugging each other and offering congratulations to the store’s general manager, Hector Gonzales.
Makimba Fizer, a sales representative, marched through the aisles carrying a large red sign that read: “We won!”
Gonzales said he was pleased with the outcome. The company, he said, conducted a fair campaign to inform workers of their rights. “I felt all along that our partners liked our open-door policy of management. This just proves it,” he said.
One of those closely watching developments at the Fullerton store was John Sperry, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 324 in Buena Park.
A victory at Sam’s would have been an “important first step” in cracking the non-union food retailers, Sperry said. Local 324, representing 23,000 workers, is girding for a fight with non-union K mart, which is expected to open one of several new merchandise and food stores in Orange County next month.
“We’ll be there the day they open,” Sperry said.
Debbie Hackamack, an eight-year employee at the Fullerton store, said she voted for the union, believing that a contract could result in better health-care benefits and greater job security. “I thought we gave it our best shot.”
