Time running out on grocery contract

Supermarket workers in Southern California likely will see their contract with three major store chains expire next week, but that doesn’t mean a strike or lockout within the industry is imminent.

Negotiations are expected to resume in March, and both sides are likely to extend the current contract while a new agreement is negotiated, said Greg Conger, president of Local 324 of United Food & Commercial Workers in Santa Ana.

The current agreement, which covers more than 60,000 workers, is scheduled to expire next Monday.

Two negotiations were held in February between union officials and representatives of Vons, Albertsons and Ralphs, but no progress was made and it remains unclear when a new agreement might be reached, Conger said.

“Their strategy is to drag this out and put more pressure on our workers,” said Conger, whose local represents supermarket employees in Orange County. “They haven’t even proposed anything. They’re working off what we’ve proposed to them.”

Conger declined to discuss specifically what the union has proposed, but he did not strike a conciliatory note when asked about the union’s bargaining strategy.

“Presumably, we aren’t talking about giving anything back,” he said.

Officials with the three supermarket chains could not be reached for comment. Bill Lathrop, president of the union’s Local 1167 in Riverside, which represents grocery workers in the Inland Empire, also could not be reached.

When a union contract expires, it’s common for both sides to extend the agreement to avoid a strike or lockout. Three years ago, the contract between the supermarkets and UFCW was extended for six months while a new agreement was worked out.

Stater Bros., the San Bernardino-based supermarket chain and the largest private employer in the Inland Empire, with more than 18,000 workers, is negotiating its own agreement with the six UFCW locals.

Conger indicated those talks are going better than the sessions with the other three supermarket chains.

“We’ve made some real progress with [Stater Bros.],” he said.