About 1,400 striking workers at four Kellogg cereal plants in the United States have rejected a tentative agreement on a five-year contract negotiated by their union, the company said on Tuesday.
The Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union, which represents the workers, did not reveal the vote totals but said in a statement that its members had “overwhelmingly voted” against the agreement.
The Kellogg rejection is “similar to what we saw earlier on in Deere,” said Johnnie Kallas, a Ph.D.
According to a summary provided by the company, the new agreement would have immediately moved all employees with four or more years at Kellogg into the veteran tier.
Under the rejected agreement, veteran workers, who Kellogg has said make about $35 an hour on average, would have received a 3 percent wage increase in the first year and cost-of-living adjustments in subsequent years.
The company previously proposed eliminating the cap on the percentage of lower-tier workers and setting up a six-year progression to the veteran tier.
“As soon as the lower tier has 50 plus one, they have voting power on future contracts and my wage can go down,” Dan Osborn, president of a Kellogg workers local in Omaha, said in an interview shortly after the strike began.
The company said in a statement in late November that it was able to “run our plants effectively with hourly and salaried employees, third-party resources and temporary replacements,” and indicated that it was hiring permanent replacement workers.
More than half the roughly 420 workers on strike at a Heaven Hill spirits bottling plant near Louisville, Ky., voted to reject a tentative agreement between their union and the company in late October, but the six-week-long strike could be prolonged only with at least two-thirds opposition under union rules
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