Grocery Workers Make Waves in the Land of Lakes

The Christmastime strike by 500 workers at five stores was a response to management interrogation, surveillance, and bargaining in bad faith. Stagnant wages have led to high turnover. Photo: UFCW Local 663.

January 22, 2024 / Lisa Xu

It wasn’t such a merry Christmas for grocery store management in central Minnesota. Five hundred grocery workers in the Brainerd Lakes area walked out on an unfair labor practice strike, deserting five stores between December 22 and 25.

Management tried to keep the stores running, but workers said they turned into disaster zones.

Why did two Cub Foods stores, two Super Ones, and a SuperValu find themselves on Santa’s naughty list last year? Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 663 charges management with interrogation, surveillance, intimidation, and bargaining in bad faith.

Those misdeeds included infiltrating a WhatsApp group chat for workers and stationing “loss prevention” employees—who normally focus on catching shoplifters—near the store exits to intimidate workers out of participating in walkouts leading up to the strike.

FULL story: https://labornotes.org/2024/01/grocery-workers-make-waves-land-lakes