Hundreds of union employees of the 150-year-old Bemis Company went out on strike as of 11 p.m. on July 21, in Terre Haute, Indiana.
Bemis supplies packaging materials to food industries primarily. The Terre Haute factory is one of Bemis’s 83 plants worldwide and specializes in polyethylene packaging.
Union staff said the vote to strike was unanimous, according to media reports.
Union spokesman Bill Kirby says, “The key issues are temporary employees, insurance coverage that can be unilaterally changed for the life of the contract, temporary transfers, one-week plant shutdowns up to four times per year and changes in the maintenance job duties and classifications,” according to Terre Haute’s Tribune-Star.
A Bemis employee posted his concern on a finance blogsite [Yahoo Finance] that Bemis is trying to get rid of the company’s unions: “Bemis is trying a new lean project called world class manufacturing. They have [gone] from about 900 union employees to around 700. They want nonunion summer help on the union shop floor. They start up teams to bypass the union and the labor contract. They want to merge classifications and they have decreased workers benefits the last seven years.”
Bemis Co. spokesperson Kristine Pavletich believes the package offered to employees is above standard for the region, according to the Tribune-Star.
The company is currently forming alternative plans to allow uninterrupted service to their customers.
Of the nearly 950 employees, the Terre Haute factory has fewer than 200 that are nonunion.
Bemis supplies packaging materials to food industries primarily. The Terre Haute factory is one of Bemis’s 83 plants worldwide and specializes in polyethylene packaging.
Union staff said the vote to strike was unanimous, according to media reports.
Union spokesman Bill Kirby says, “The key issues are temporary employees, insurance coverage that can be unilaterally changed for the life of the contract, temporary transfers, one-week plant shutdowns up to four times per year and changes in the maintenance job duties and classifications,” according to Terre Haute’s Tribune-Star.
A Bemis employee posted his concern on a finance blogsite [Yahoo Finance] that Bemis is trying to get rid of the company’s unions: “Bemis is trying a new lean project called world class manufacturing. They have [gone] from about 900 union employees to around 700. They want nonunion summer help on the union shop floor. They start up teams to bypass the union and the labor contract. They want to merge classifications and they have decreased workers benefits the last seven years.”
Bemis Co. spokesperson Kristine Pavletich believes the package offered to employees is above standard for the region, according to the Tribune-Star.
The company is currently forming alternative plans to allow uninterrupted service to their customers.
Of the nearly 950 employees, the Terre Haute factory has fewer than 200 that are nonunion.
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