Darigold's Most Recent 'Offer' An Insult to Workers, Customers

Darigold's Most Recent 'Offer' An Insult to Workers, Customers

Company Didn’t Follow Protocol in Making Last Week’s Alleged Contract Offer

December 15, 2003

(Seattle, Washington) – Despite Darigold management’s public statements that it wanted to return Darigold employees to their jobs before Christmas, Teamsters officials say they believe the company was merely floating an inferior contract offer for the benefit of the media to offset the effects of a Teamsters boycott of Darigold products.

“They had no intention of making a serious offer and there was no serious negotiation,” said Garnet Zimmerman, Teamsters International Vice President. “The company was playing politics with consumers and supporters of the boycott.”

Rather than alert Teamsters’ lead Darigold negotiators of a possible new offer for the 200 members of Teamsters Local 66 locked out of their jobs since August 31, Zimmerman said the company faxed a copy of the proposal to various Seattle media outlets several hours before sending the proposal to Teamsters Local 66’s counsel.

“The first I heard of this proposal came from a newspaper reporter hours before the company ever thought it important to send the proposal to us,” said Mark Jones, Teamsters Local 66 Secretary-Treasurer.

“If the company had been at all serious about trying to conclude a collective agreement, they would have called the Federal Mediator who has been involved in this dispute since before the workers were locked out. The mediator would have brought the parties back together, and we would have sat down to negotiate a resolution,” Zimmerman said. “Instead, Darigold played games.”

Teamsters Local 66 members’ contract with Darigold expired on July 31. Immediately after, Darigold severed 14 warehouse employees and outsourced the jobs of another 60 drivers. A month later, Darigold locked out its production workers.