NLRB Cancels Union Election at Mrs. Green's Natural Market After More Labor Charges Filed Against Employer

WESTBURY, NY (10/20/2014)(readMedia)-- United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1500, New York's largest grocery workers union announced that the National Labor Relations Board [NLRB] has canceled the October 17th union election due to new charges against Mrs. Green's Natural Market for violating federal labor laws over the last three months.

"We're disappointed that Mrs. Green's new CEO has decided to take the company in the same direction as their former CEO," said UFCW Local 1500 President Bruce Both, alluding to the recent appointment of Pat Brown as CEO of Mrs. Green's Natural Market. "Like his predecessor, Mr. Brown failed to take advantage of an opportunity to address the serious labor management problems at Mrs. Green's Natural Market by declining to implement a fair and democratic process for the workers at Mrs. Green's to elect to join a union." Thirteen total charges were filed against the Mrs. Green's that lead to the NLRB canceling the union election. Charges included: "Select employees were granted wage increases" "Select employees' hours were cut in retaliation for their support of the Union" "Employees could not get raises due to Union election", the other 10 instances are attached to this release for download.

Mrs. Green's Natural Market has settled over 20 labor violations in the last 15 months with the National Labor Relations Board. Under Brown's predecessor's leadership, the company was charged with illegally firing eight longtime workers from its Mt. Kisco store for supporting the UFCW union. Those workers were left on a picket line for over 6 months in front of the store, until the company succumbed to community and political pressure to rehire them.

"Mrs. Green's management is clearly intimidated by their employees banding together to collectively demand more from their employer, and the company has repeatedly shown they are willing to do whatever it takes, including breaking federal labor laws, to keep the union out," said UFCW Local 1500 President Bruce Both.

For more information on the workers at Mrs. Green's Natural Market please visit www.mrsgreeds.com.

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United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 1500, based out of Westbury, New York, represents over 23,000 grocery workers in New York City, Long Island, Westchester, Putnam and Dutchess Counties.

Stay up to date with UFCW Local 1500 on twitter @ufcw1500, and at www.ufcw1500.org.

Contact UFCW Local 1500 at info@ufcw1500.org.