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UNION OF RADICAL WORKERS AND WRITERS

CONVENES FIRST BOOKSTORE WORKERS ORGANIZING FORUM

SATURDAY, JANUARY 17, 2004: 10:00AM-4:00PM

COMMUNICATION WORKERS OF AMERICA LOCAL 7200 UNION HALL

3521 EAST LAKE STREET, MINNEAPOLIS

The Union of Radical Workers and Writers [U.R.W.W.] is convening what is believed to be the first conference dedicated to organizing bookstore workers across the Americas on Saturday, January 17, 2004. Scheduled to coincide with the World Social Forum gathering in Mumbai, India, the conference: “Resist Retail Nihilism: A Bookstore Workers Organizing Forum,” will gather bookstore workers from the currently striking Borders #1 store in Ann Arbor, Michigan, unionized workers from the Borders’ Calhoun Square store in Minneapolis, Minnesota, as well as independent, corporate, and used bookstore workers from Chicago, Milwaukee, and across the continent.

Local and regional bookstore workers, retail workers, and the general public are invited to attend any or all of this day-long event. Agenda items include roundtable discussions on the history of bookstore organizing, how to organize your bookstore or retail workplace, how to build community coalitions, and much more.

For more information, please visit the Union of Radical Workers and Writers website at http://www.urww.org, or contact URWW via email at [email protected]

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What I find interesting about this is that, both in Canada and the United States, bookstores have been one of the major sites of independent retail worker organizing. This has not come from any "targetting" by unions, which have historically had very little representation in the industry outside of grocery stores. Rather, it's been bottom-up worker militancy that has largely blazed the trail, and brought the unions along with it.

Examples include the following:

Chapters/Indigo (Canada): Striking Back - Montreal Indigo workers finally get their union

University of Toronto Bookstore (Canada): Bookstore Blues - Part-time workers want parity

Powells (U.S. West Coast): Powells Workers organizing drive

Borders (U.S.):History of Borders Union Drive

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You know what would be really cool? You know how at bookstores, they get all the staff to pick a book they like and then they display those books as "so-and-so's pick"?
If bookstore workers who were organizing or trying to organize, or going through contract negotiations all picked books about labour events or big box stores or whatever, that would be pretty funny. A nice little dig.

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It's a very good idea. During the first wave of union organizing at Borders in 1996/1997, Michael Moore even got in on the act - promoting the union while doing his book tour. It's documented in his movie "The Big One."

One of the major issues in the Borders union drive has been management's systematic undercutting of workers' ability to promote books in this way. Borders brought in a standardized, corporate practice of promoting books called "Category Management" that provoked outrage not only from the workers, but also from a group of prominent authors.