Union, area supermarkets brace for walkout this week

Fry's and Safeway supermarkets, their 25,000 union employees and their Arizona customers are bracing for an increasingly likely strike.

Workers are set to walk off the job at 6 p.m. Friday barring a breakthrough in stalled contract negotiations.

For consumers, that could mean picket lines and reduced hours at neighborhood markets.


It would be the first general Arizona grocery strike in recent memory and comes as consumers, workers and the companies are struggling with the impact of the recession.

Both Fry's and Safeway have seen sales slide during the year, and a strike would further cut into revenue.

A 20-week 2003 grocery strike in Southern California cost grocers more than $2 billion in lost revenue and the workers a similar amount in lost wages.

Employees, many who make under $10 per hour, also would be hit hard with the holiday season just around the corner. Eligible union members would have to make do with $100 per week in strike pay.

Ellen Anreder, a spokeswoman for the employees' United Food and Commercial Workers Union Local 99, said the organization has had no further contact with the companies and that it was preparing for a strike.

"We're still hoping that the companies will come back with an offer we can accept," she said.

On Tuesday, the companies also were preparing for a strike. They were busy hiring replacements for striking workers and making arrangements to operate their stores with skeleton crews.

Spokeswoman JoEllen Lynn said Fry's has hired about 300 temporary employees and that its parent, Kroger Co., was flying in workers from out of state. Local managers and other salaried employees were being trained to stock shelves and run cash registers.

"We want to be ready to serve our customers," Lynn said.

Safeway is taking similar action.

Also on Tuesday, Safeway and Fry's signed a mutual lockout agreement in the event the union calls a strike at only one of the companies. The agreement calls for the non-struck company to lock out its union workers if a strike is called against the other.

The companies called it a defensive measure to prevent the union from playing the companies and their employees against each other.

The union was working Tuesday to line up food, clothing and other resources to help employees cope with the economic hardships a strike would bring.

The union also has been working to dispel growing worker unrest about a strike and rebuild solidarity among its members.

Disgruntled union members held anti-strike rallies in Phoenix on Monday and Tuesday to try to stall the walkout.

"Now is not the time for a strike," said Michele Malburg, a Fry's employee.

From the union's perspective, now is the time it has the most leverage.

A walkout could cripple the two grocery chains as they head into the holidays, the biggest grocery-shopping season.

The union last week issued the companies an ultimatum to either deliver an acceptable contract offer by 6 p.m. Friday or face a walkout.

While both sides remain apart on salary and benefit
issues, the impasse is over a company proposal that employees shoulder some of their health-care costs. The workers now pay nothing for health insurance.

The proposal calls for new hires to pay up to $15 per week for coverage