Costco bosses basked in praise for making union-friendly statements but have yet to commit to bargain in good faith.
Last December, a group of 238 Costco workers in Norfolk, Virginia, voted to unionize and join Teamsters Local 822. The local declared the vote “the union’s first organizing victory at the wholesale retailer in two decades.” The voices of the pro-union workers who won this contested election — the vote was 111-92 — were quickly overshadowed, however, by a letter from Costco’s leadership that garnered much attention beyond the shop floor.
Outgoing Chief Executive Officer Craig Jelinek and incoming CEO President Ron Vachris stated in a letter addressed to all Costco employees, that “we’re disappointed by the result” of the union election. But, they added, “We’re not disappointed in our employees; we’re disappointed in ourselves as managers and leaders.” In their view, the employees voted for a union because management failed to satisfy its “core value of ‘taking care of our employees.’”
For an HR letter, it went viral. Much praise was lavished onto Jelinek and Vachris for their “graceful” and “classy” response. CNN described the letter as “surprising” and in “stark contrast” to “other companies, such as Starbucks, [which] have pushed back hard against union organizing.” Others praised Costco’s “emotional intelligence” and ability to look “inward.”
During the early 1990s, Costco competed with Price Club, another retailer that already had unionized workers. When Costco merged with Price Club in 1993, many of the union warehouses (mostly located in California) remained union. In the early to mid-2000s, the Teamsters expanded the number of union warehouses with some successful campaigns in New Jersey, New York, Maryland and Virginia. But it was always a challenge.
I only worked there for a few months. I was not treated well.
They gave me most of my schedule within a few days of my shifts, and frequently called me in my off days to demand I come in. This is against official policy, but clearly it wasn’t enforced.
Additionally, I was blatantly lied to during the interview then gaslit. The only reason I accepted the job was because they had recruiters at my college advertising a program where students would only work seasonally outside college semesters. I wanted to focus on my studies and my college was very cheap. They reiterated that during my interview. A few days from my semester starting, they started listing several upcoming days where I’d need to work, and called me a liar for telling them I wasn’t supposed to work outside semesters.
There were other issues I’d rather not bother writing here.
The most insulting part of all this isn’t even how they treated me, it’s how I can’t bring that up to anyone without people jumping to poor lil Costco’s defense and saying it’s “for sure only the store you worked at”.
In case anybody feels the urge to call me spoiled, I also worked at Walmart and it didn’t really leave an impression on me. It was fine, my only negative experience there was one HR person.