UFCW Local 789 Organizes the Future of Retail

by Joel Haskard

"Do you work retail? Are you paid what you are worth? Treated with dignity and fairness? Getting health care and other benefits? Have a reasonable say in your working conditions? Only a few of the 22 million Americans working retail can answer YES to all the questions above."

So begins the homepage of youareworthmore.org, a project of South St. Paul's UFCW Local 789. Inspired by an article in The Nation, "A Proposal to American Labor," by Richard Freeman and Joel Rodgers, the site hopes to be a cyber union hall of sorts: a place where workers can find out about their rights, ask questions, problem solve together and gain the tools they need to meet their goals.

"Unfortunately, the labor movement has been slow to use the internet in an interactive capacity," says UFCW Local 789 president Bill Pearson. "Workers want a place to come and talk, share ideas, and look for help."

One of the site's features, "Ask The Rep," is downright addictive. People from all over the country write in daily with questions, comments and concerns, usually to find a detailed answer posted back to them within 24 hours by Pearson himself. "When we put the 'Ask the Rep' feature up, we never envisioned it being so popular," Pearson says. "It's become painfully evident that retail workers are being taken advantage of across the country." If you are interested in the problems facing retail workers, or the sincerity of the union to reach out and help them, "Ask the Rep" is a great place to start.

And progress is starting to build. On Oct. 17, workers at the Uptown Borders bookstore voted 15-6 to unionize with UFCW 789, becoming the only Borders employees in the country to do so. The youareworthmore.org site and bordersunion.com were instrumental in that process.

"The youareworthmore.org and bordersunion.com Web sites were and continue to be invaluable," says Jason Evans, an employee in Uptown Borders' shipping and receiving department. "They allow us to gather information from those who had participated and who are participating in retail organizing. We were given details that otherwise might have escaped us and made contacts that wouldn't have been available. We were able to have conversations with labor lawyers, social advocacy groups, union leaders, fellow booksellers, ex-managers, reporters, college students, customers and countless people who were drawn to the site because of its social value and uniqueness. All participated, in one way or another, to our victory October 18th and we will call on them again as we begin to negotiate a fair contract."

On Dec. 6, the Borders flagship store in Ann Arbor, Mich., right next to corporate headquarters, voted by an amazing 51-4 margin to unionize with UFCW #876. That win makes the second Borders store in the last two months that has unionized due to the efforts of internet organizing.