The pro-union workers said that they are not trying to “go against or create conflict with” Apple management and note “access to rights we do not currently have” as a primary reason for their attempt.
Last month, the Apple store at the Cumberland Mall in Atlanta, Georgia, became the first to file for a union election and workers at Apple’s Grand Central Terminal retail store in New York City announced steps to unionize.However, workers at the different stores have varying but similar demands, with those in New York asking for a $30 minimum wage, while demands by employees in Atlanta revolve around “transparency around pay inequality, cost of living adjustments, and real living wages.”
Organizers have said that while Apple’s revenue has grown rapidly with $97.3 billion in revenue in its fiscal second quarter, the company has been slow to increase worker pay, according to the Post.
There has been a wave of retail worker activism across the country since the pandemic hit in early 2020, leading to a strained labor market.
Store employees at several major service and retail companies, like Starbucks, Amazon, and Apple have seized the opportunity to demand higher wages and more benefits.
The activists have requested that Apple and its CEO voluntarily recognize their union and said that they intend to file paperwork with the National Labor Relations Board (NRLB) in the coming days to hold an election, if the company refuses to do so.
If the NRLB agrees that there is enough support for a union, Apple and the organizers will have to determine who would be eligible to join the union and vote, before a date is decided for the election.
On May 3, Apple finally acceded to demands by agreeing to schedule a union vote on June 2 with the workers in Atlanta.Meanwhile, a group of Apple corporate office employees have formed an organization known as Apple Together.
The group recently protested the company’s new return to office plan for corporate employees, which includes a hybrid schedule of three days in the office and two flexible days where employees can work remotely.They claim that the highly segmented structure of Apple’s corporate offices makes it hard to interact with colleagues, that keeping employees at offices hurts diversity, and that commuter times cut into their productivity.
Unionization efforts at Apple so far are the work of several independent groups, rather than being driven by one of the national labor unions, like at Starbucks.
The three Apple stores have partnered with different established unions, with Atlanta and the Communications Workers of America, New York with Workers United, and the workers in Maryland with the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers.