UFCW Local 400 is using the recent ratification of the Kroger contract, which raises wages for approximately 3,700 Kroger employees in 22 stores in the Richmond and Hampton Roads areas in Virginia, as a platform to increase membership in union and nonunion Kroger stores in the area.
Over the past few months, a team of UFCW Local 400 members who work at Kroger, Safeway and Giant stores in Virginia, West Virginia and Washington, D.C., have had member-to-member conversations with over 8,000 nonunion Kroger employees at the 22 stores about the value that comes with joining our union family. This team is now highlighting the new contract wins, including wage increases, protected health care and retirement benefits, bonuses for the most experienced associates and premium pay for select positions in the stores. To date, the sign-up campaign has generated over 900 new members and a few of the 22 stores have increased membership to over 60 percent.
UFCW Local 400 has also added a union wage calculator and online authorization card to the BetterKroger.org website as part of their campaign to reach Kroger workers in seven nonunion stores in Virginia. Under the new Kroger contract, every associate at a nonunion store in Virginia – no matter how much they make now – would make more money if they were unionized. With the union wage calculator, Kroger workers can punch in their current pay rate, classification, and worksite and calculate how much their wages would increase if they joined UFCW Local 400. To further assist Kroger workers who want to join our union, the online authorization card allows workers to sign up for union representation easily and confidentially. Once a majority of workers at a Kroger store sign cards online or on paper, the store will unionize under the current contract.
“In addition to all of the other benefits of a union contract, now Kroger associates in Virginia can learn how much more money they would make by joining our union family,” said UFCW Local 400 Communications Director Jonathan Williams. “It truly pays to belong.”
For more information about this ongoing campaign to grow our union family in Virginia, contact Jonathan Williams at jwilliams@local400.org or Kayla Mock at kmock@local400.org.