Whole Foods takes its first steps towards unionization

Workers at Whole Foods, the health-based grocery store chain bought by Amazon a little over a year ago, are starting to organize it.

An e-mail, first introduced this morning by the Wall Street Journal, then obtained by a new editorial of New Food Economy, proposes a collective action of the basic employees of the store to increase the minimum wage, among other advantages, and a stream of staff cuts that began in 2015 and continued under the leadership of Jeff Bezos.

"Amazon has just become that big weight where I could not take advantage of the millions of dollars that Jeff Bezos earns," said a current employee of Whole Foods in Gizmodo. "No salary increase has been reported. At all. Prices fell by only a few cents and the items that were dropped were already low cost items. Amazon is a joke. Clients feel betrayed.

It is unclear to what extent the e-mail has been broadcast in more than 450 sites, and the note does not mention any pre-existing union that this committee of organizers intends to join. This is the same movement towards a unified front, but it is all the more important that Amazon's historical ability to resist unionization efforts in the United States has occurred in many European warehouses of the society. a place here – although, if Whole Foods workers are finally able to cope with their demands, it could launch such efforts more broadly within Amazon.

We contacted Amazon for a comment. Read the full memo below:

Dear members of the team,

We are writing to you today as a group of members of the Whole Foods Market team who are concerned about the direction of our company.

Over the past year, Layoffs and Workstation Consolidation at Whole Foods Market have disrupted the livelihoods of team members, raised concerns [sic] in shops. Many executives are well aware that when John Mackey sold WFM to Jeff Bezos last year, this deal included an agreement to reduce hundreds of millions of dollars in our stores. There will always be layoffs in 2019 and beyond, while Amazon aims to aggressively reduce our workforce before it develops with new technology and business models. labor-& # 39; work. Positions, including departmental editors, supervisors, store scanners, and customer service desk positions are currently the most vulnerable.

It has become evident over the past three years that the WFM has not lived up to its value of supporting the happiness and excellence of the team members. John Mackey says that "customers are our most important stakeholders" and that customers are clearly important, we believe that team members are stakeholders of equal importance to customers. Whole Foods would stop literally without the hard work that members of the FMM team put to work every day. Without all our efforts, Whole Foods would never have survived the difficult years we have gone through. And without our hard work and dedications today, Whole Foods would literally have no value.

It's time to hold John Mackey responsible for supporting his team members. It is not acceptable to fire dedicated team members with meager severance pay, no health insurance and just offer the opportunity to apply for other positions at a salary significantly lower.

Many team members may not be aware that WFM has provided profit sharing in the form of stock options for full-time team members above 6000 hours of service prior to the acquisition of Amazon last year. Currently, under Amazon, only the management positions of stores and home offices receive Amazon shares, neglecting the well deserved compensation of members of the store teams. This is unacceptable.

We can not let Amazon rebuild the entire North American business landscape without embracing the full value of its team members. The success of Amazon and WFM should not come at the cost of exploiting our dedication and the threat to our economic stability. Therefore, we should require a labor model offering a minimum wage of $ 15, 401K, paid maternity leave, lower health insurance deductibles, a system of bonus and fair and equitable sharing, and sharing of benefits. profits. If Amazon and Whole Foods continue their momentum with a work model similar to Walmart's, it will be a huge loss for us all.

In order to empower Amazon and WFM in supporting their team members, we are forming an interregional committee composed of interested team members who would like to organize to create a platform that will require Amazon to respond to our needs. requests. This is extremely difficult to achieve as individual stores. However, if we organize our efforts nationwide, it will be impossible for the leaders of Amazon and WFM to ignore them.

If you are interested in this cause and would like to join the interregional committee, please send an email to: [REDACTED] and we will send you additional information with instructions. Your complete confidentiality will be protected. It is illegal for Whole Foods to threaten, intimidate and / or retaliate against workers who are organizing for better working conditions, and we will take steps to protect those who wish to help. You can also forward this letter to other members of the team or post it on your communication boards, as we want to connect with as many team members as possible.

All members of the Whole Foods Market store team were affected by the layoffs of 2015 and every member of the store team will be affected by a future restructuring. Help us fight Amazon, WFM and John Mackey.

Regards,

Members of the Cross Regional Committee of the WFM Team

Are you a member of the Cross Regional Committee or a Whole Foods employee who thinks about unionization? Send us an e-mail, tell us about Keybase or send us anonymous information via our Secure Drop server.