Labor board complaint accuses Trader Joe's of pressuring NYC store not to unionize

A vote against unionization at a Trader Joe’s location on the Lower East Side earlier this year was undermined by managers who violated federal labor laws by discouraging workers to join, according to a complaint filed by the National Labor Relations Board's Manhattan office this week.

Supervisors at the grocery store on 400 Grand St. required employees to attend one-on-one meetings where they were discouraged from supporting the Trader Joe’s United union, an independent union formed in 2022, the complaint said. Managers also maintained a rule banning union literature in the break room and removed anything they found, according to the complaint.

It also accused managers of telling workers that a strike disrupting their shifts was inevitable and that a union could not have protected them from poor working conditions, like an apparent sewer leak in the store.

Some workers at the store told Gothamist last year that a union would help them hold Trader Joe’s accountable for situations including raw sewage reportedly seeping from the ceiling of the store onto food below. At that point, the workers were preparing to submit a petition to the labor board, officially requesting a union.

An election for unionization held in April resulted in a tie, according to the labor board. The union then submitted a filing to the board claiming unfair labor practices on the part of Trader Joe’s.

The labor board's regional director agreed that the election results were compromised due to managers’ behavior, since a majority of workers had expressed before the election that they wanted to unionize through authorization cards, according to the board.

A hearing on the matter is set to be held by a National Labor Relations Board administrative law judge in Manhattan in January.

Seth Goldstein, an attorney for the union, said the managers’ conduct amounted to “scorched-earth union busting.” He said the store instituted a 24-hour rule where workers couldn’t talk about the union before the election, held “captive audience meetings,” and removed union literature.

Trader Joe’s corporate offices did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Goldstein said the union’s fight at the Lower East Side location represents a broader one happening across the U.S.

“I think it's really fitting that this battle is being waged in [what’s now the] Essex Crossing [development], which is the heart of where 20th-century labor started with the garment workers,” he said. “And you're seeing this new generation of workers arising who have stood up and said, ‘You know, we're going to also have decent working conditions [and] we're not going to let the plutocrats tell us what to do.’”

The labor board complaint seeks a mandatory bargaining order, which would force Trader Joe’s to recognize the union, despite the election results, because the union had majority support leading up to the election. It’s known as a “Cemex” bargaining order, named after the company in a previous labor board decision that led to the agency rewriting the rules under which a union can be established.

It’s not the first time the National Labor Relations Board's regional office has filed a complaint against Trader Joe’s. In January, a complaint alleged that Trader Joe's engaged in unfair labor practices when it abruptly closed the former Trader Joe’s Wine Shop in Union Square, where workers were also trying to unionize. A hearing for that case concluded in August, and the results from it are pending.