Previously: Black Friday labor demonstration in Roeland Park, Kansas (November 23, 2012)

A press release from Walmart:

The following statement can be attributed to David Tovar, Vice President, Corporate Communications.

Nov. 23, 2012 – The number of protests being reported by the UFCW are grossly exaggerated. We are aware of a few dozen protests at our stores today. The number of associates that have missed their scheduled shift today is more than 60 percent less than Black Friday last year.

It was proven last night – and again today – that the OUR Walmart group doesn’t speak for the 1.3 million Walmart associates. We had our best Black Friday ever and OUR Walmart was unable  to recruit more than a small number of associates to participate in these made for TV events. Press reports are now exposing what we have said all along – the large majority of protesters aren’t even Walmart workers.

“…the large majority of protesters aren’t even Walmart workers…”

And why would that be? Are they happy campers? Are there consequences for speaking out, either way? Just asking.

No matter how much the corporation tries to spin it, this is the new meme.

A demonstrator in Roeland Park, Kansas on “Black Friday”, November 23, 2012.

From yesterday’s broadcast report on KSHB on the labor demonstration in Roeland Park, Kansas:

Lisa Benson, KSHB: [quoting a Walmart press release] “…Press reports are now exposing what we have said all along, the large majority of protesters aren’t even Walmart workers.”

A significant fact that doesn’t appear to bother these protesters who are standing for the rights of workers as they work. Now demonstrators say employees need to unionize, but again, there were no Walmart employees at that demonstration, so we were not able to ask them what they want.

“…there were no Walmart employees at that demonstration, so we were not able to ask them what they want…”

Uh, is a demonstration the only place you can seek out employees if you want to ask them questions? Just asking.

That wasn’t the point. This is:

November 24, 2012 9:07 AM

The Black Friday worker actions at Wal-Mart: why they mattered

By Kathleen Geier

….a strategy of gradual escalation that will be the “new permanent reality” for Wal-Mart: keeping the pressure on, and throwing a harsh national spotlight on the retailer’s bottom-feeding, exploitative labor practices.

Why do these actions matter? First of all, there’s the brute fact of Wal-Mart’s enormous size and power. Wal-Mart is the third largest public corporation in the world, and also the world’s largest private employer, and largest retailer. And as historians like Bethany Moreton have pointed out, when it comes to its employees, Wal-Mart, with its roots in the culture of the agrarian South, has always taken an anti-modern, deeply feudalistic and patriarchal approach. Its economic model is based on low-wage labor, and it has been notable as one of the most vehemently anti-union employers in American history. Since Wal-Mart is such a behemoth, and since its ideology is so passionately anti-labor, it has been one of the driving forces in our economy that has been disempowering and immiserating American workers and accelerating economic inequality. Here, for example, are a few shocking stats, from internal Wal-Mart documents that were recently released: low-level workers at Wal-Mart generally start at only $8 per hour, and, even if their evaluations are flawless, are eligible for a yearly raise that is, at maximum, 60 cents per hour. Most workers get only 20 to 40 cents, and the average worker, after working there for six years, would only be making $10.60 an hour….

To put it in the words of an organizer of yesterday’s demonstration in Roeland Park, Kansas:

….Walmart set the standard to open on Thanksgiving night. Sears, Kmart, everybody else followed suit. When Walmart does it everybody else does it. So next Thanksgiving, when you’re sitting at the, at the dinner table and some of your family’s not there because they’re at work this is why….

When people start paying attention you’ve already lost, no matter how furiously you continue to spin.

“…So next Thanksgiving, when you’re sitting at the, at the dinner table and some of your family’s not there because they’re at work this is why…”

A Black Friday labor demonstration at the parking lot entrance of the Walmart store in Roeland Park, Kansas.

Starting at noon today approximately one hundred people, a mix of union members, young people, and older activists, demonstrated in front of the Walmart store in Roeland Park, Kansas, protesting the Thanksgiving evening opening and other worker issues. The union members, identifiable by the logos on their clothing, included Teamsters, Communications Workers of America, United Auto Workers, and Carpenters/Joiners.

Mike Frommer, one of the organizers, spoke with the media:

Mike Frommer: …Living wage, full time employment, uh, and most of all, protection from retaliation, to be able to say these things without somebody saying, hey, you know, you’re gonna lose your job if you’re talking like that.

[….]

Question: There was a group at Independence [Missouri], at the Walmart. Is there another group, or do you know?

Mike Frommer: Uh, this is, you know, this is a, uh, it’s an online thing.

Question: Okay.

Mike Frommer: Any individual group can go online, pick out a demonstration that they want to attend, and, and just kind of do their own thing.

Question: It’s not a real organized, just for like [crosstalk][inaudible] here, if you want to show up.

Mike Frommer: It’s, yeah, you can do, you can do it anywhere, you know, any group, we’ve had people that have gone out strike in, in places like Oklahoma City where the workers just walked out. They contacted no one. They just did it by using the web site.

Question: Have any Walmart workers walked out today [crosstalk] that are in this group?

Mike Frommer: At this store? Not at this store.

Question: Okay.

Mike Frommer: But we just chose this store, just for, for solidarity.

[….]

Question: And is it just about Walmart, or is it other retailers that?

Mike Frommer: Well, I, I think Walmart sets the standard. Walmart set the standard to open on Thanksgiving night. Sears, Kmart, everybody else followed suit. When Walmart does it everybody else does it. So next Thanksgiving, when you’re sitting at the, at the dinner table and some of your family’s not there because they’re at work this is why.

[….]

The demonstration press release:

For release Nov. 23, 2012        

Contacts: Judy Ancel, KC Jobs with Justice [….]

Mike Frommer, UFCW [….]

Santino Scalici, autoworker and UAW member [….]

Local Citizens Join Nationwide Black Friday Protest Against Walmart

A group of local citizens and working people will gather outside the Walmart Store at 5150 Roe Blvd, Roeland Park, KS at noon on Black Friday, Nov. 23rd. They come together to stand with retail and warehouse workers who will be striking and demanding respect and their rights from Walmart on this the busiest shopping day of the year.

Starting last summer, workers all along Walmart’s production chain began the first-ever strikes against the company. Many have joined OUR WALMART, a mutual aid organization of Walmart workers. A number as a result are now facing retaliation by Walmart.

Friday’s rally is organized by Kansas City area working people, including a number of union members, and Kansas City Jobs with Justice, who are concerned about the effects of Walmart’s low wages and poor treatment of its associates on all workers and our communities. They object to retaliation against workers who are protesting bad conditions and harassment on the job. They are dismayed by Walmart’s discrimination against women workers and people of color, wages that average $8.81 an hour, unaffordable benefits, and shifting of costs onto taxpayers. The Missouri Department of Social Services reported last year that 10,028 Walmart employees and their families enrolled in Missouri’s Medicaid program- MO HealthNet, and its well-known that many Walmart Associates qualify for food stamps.

Walmart’s leadership in driving down standards can be seen in the progressive erosion of their workers’ Thanksgiving holiday in the last few years, which has now spread to their competitors. Black Friday has become Black Thursday eliminating one of the few times all year when families have a common holiday and can get together.

Santino Scalici, an autoworker and one of the organizers of Friday’s rally said, “We want Walmart workers to know that when Walmart retaliates against workers who stand up for their rights and dignity, we will be there to support them.  It’s time we support Walmart workers in their legal right to a democratic voice in the decisions that affect their lives.”

For more information about Walmart worker organizing and the company, visit http://www.makingchangeatwalmart.org and http://www.forrespect.org.

—end—

[emphasis in original]

Pickets along Roe Boulevard in Roeland Park, Kansas.

Three Kansas City area television stations had crews covering the demonstration. There was at least one (apparent) print reporter interviewing people at the demonstration.

From what we heard in the crowd individuals entered a store in Independence, Missouri earlier in the day and passed out leaflets. They were told to leave.