Dive Brief:
- Compass Coffee and workers at seven locations in Washington, D.C., and Virginia, comprising five potential bargaining units, will face a period of extended uncertainty following a union election Tuesday.
- The union, Compass Coffee United, led at all bargaining units, with 22 votes cast in favor of the union and none cast against it. About 101 voters were challenged and their ballots were impounded by the NLRB without being opened and counted.
- In all five elections, the number of challenged ballots is greater than the margin of victory. The National Labor Relations Board will hear challenges to individual votes and determine voter eligibility before counting any challenged ballots found to be valid.
Dive Insight:
The number of votes cast — 123 ballots — far exceeds the estimated number of workers in the bargaining units at the time the union filed for elections, which was 47. In June, shortly after the union drive began, Compass Coffee began hiring large numbers of new workers — a step that Compass explained as seasonal hiring and filling vacant positions but that workers say is aimed at increasing the vote against unionization.
Compass Coffee's union election
Penina Meier-Silverman, a shift supervisor and pro-union worker, told Restaurant Dive the union challenged scores of ballots cast by new hires that the union believes did not work the number of hours required for eligibility according to the stipulated election agreement between Compass Coffee and Compass Coffee United. The election agreement holds that eligible workers must average at least four hours a week over the 13 weeks preceding the election, meaning they need to work at least 52 total hours over that timeframe.
“We believe most of them haven't worked enough hours, so they shouldn't be eligible,” Meier-Silverman said.
Compass CEO Michael Haft described the unchallenged pro-union votes as a minority.
“The union has apparently pursued a strategy of contesting all, or virtually all, votes against unionization,” Haft said in an email. “I am confident they will lose.”
Haft said he couldn’t be sure how the challenged voters voted. He did say some workers whose votes were challenged have told him personally that they voted no.
Even if the board does rule that many, or all, of the new hires are eligible to vote, Meier-Silverman expects a fair number of them to have voted in favor of the union.
“It doesn't take long for people to realize what's going on at Compass and that there's a need for change,” Meier-Silverman said.
The stipulated election agreement said that shift supervisors would be allowed to vote but that their votes would be impounded and counted only after the NLRB determined their eligibility. The voter lists included 18 shift supervisors, but it is unclear how many voted in the election.
If the challenged ballots tip the election against the union, Compass Coffee United may still end up representing the workers in those cafes. The union has alleged in NLRB filings that Compass committed unfair labor practices during the election, including alleged retaliatory changes to disciplinary practices. In some instances, if the board finds an employer committed particular kinds of unfair labor practices, the finding invalidates the outcome of an election and the NLRB can issue a bargaining order, certifying the union as representing workers, or seek to run a second election.
Haft said he disagreed with the allegations in the unfair labor practice charges.
“We haven't changed any of our policies,” Haft said. “We've been very consistent.”
