The IBEW's New Marketing Tool
Good, old-fashioned
quality

Green Power and Red Ink
Nuclear industry seeks assist in energy marketplace

North of 49°
NextGen Young Workers Conference Inspires, Educates

Au nord du 49° parallèle
La conférence des jeunes travailleurs NextGen cherche à inspirer et à enseigner

NEAP Summary Annual Report

NEAP benefit notice

Southern Organizing Strategies
IBEW Organizes Memphis, Tenn., Manufacturing Plant

The IBEW welcomed hundreds of members into the Brotherhood Sept. 27 when the workers at Electrolux's Memphis, Tenn., plant voted by more than 2 to 1 to form a union.

More than 90 percent of the 700-member bargaining unit voted in the election and more than 70 percent of them voted to join Memphis Local 474. The victory came 16 months after the first organizing campaign fell 59 votes short.

It took two votes and more than two years of organizing by dozens of Electrolux workers, IBEW organizers from across the country and union activists from Sweden to ensure victory.

"This is the most important manufacturing victory in a southern, right-to-work state in my memory," said Director of Professional and Industrial Organizing Carmella Thomas.

Factories have been moving south from union-strong industrial cities for decades and have proven very difficult to organize. Even when the companies haven't actively opposed organizing, like Volkswagen's plant in Chattanooga two years ago, political pressure and unfamiliarity with unions has made victories rare.

The southwest Memphis plant makes high-end commercial and residential stoves and ranges that cost from $2,000 to upwards of $10,000. It was one of the highest profile economic development projects in the city when it opened two years ago. The company received state and local subsidies worth nearly $180 million to build the factory, according to an investigation by Memphis' newspaper, the Commercial Appeal.

But soon after the facility opened in 2014, there were problems, said Stanley Reese, the head of the volunteer organizing committee. Many people applied for jobs and started taking courses specifically for jobs at Electrolux after they were promised starting salaries of at least $15 an hour. But when they started work, they made closer to $12, sometimes only $11 an hour.

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October 2016

Volunteer Work Earns California Lineman National Honor