My name is Maeg Yosef. I am a crew member at Trader Joe’s in Hadley, MA where I’ve worked for the past 18 years. During that time, I witnessed the culture of Trader Joe’s shift from a workplace that is truly an outlier in the industry, with incredible pay, benefits, and atmosphere, to a company with increasing turnover, declining benefits, and stagnating wages. The pandemic put those changes into stark relief as “essential” workers everywhere were asked to risk their health in order to keep the economy going.

These two factors–the company’s internal changes and the pandemic–made it clear that we needed to have a say in our workplace, and that a union was the only answer to that need. A union could also bring Trader Joe’s back into alignment with its own core values, the values that had made it a great place to work and shop in the first place.

Even though we have won elections in four stores, Trader Joe's continues to union bust and refuse to bargain in good faith. Can you sign our urgent petition demanding that they respect our right to organize and negotiate a first contract?

In January 2022, myself and a small group of coworkers formed an organizing committee and started talking to our fellow crew members about unionizing. On July 28th, 2022, we accomplished something no one else had done before. We unionized the first Trader Joe’s, and in the process created Trader Joe’s United.

Trader Joe’s United is an independent labor union 100% founded and powered by Trader Joe’s workers. All of TJU’s leadership roles are filled by crew members. We are bagging groceries and stocking shelves while building this movement, writing proposals, and helping other stores organize. It’s not just a catchphrase–we literally are the union.

Since we announced the Hadley campaign in May of 2022, we’ve heard from hundreds of crew members across the country eager to unionize their stores, and we are helping many of them organize right now. But instead of allowing the free and fair elections they promised their workers, or bargaining in good faith, Trader Joe's has hired a union-busting law firm and is fighting us every step of the way.

Trader Joe's has fired union supporters, threatened and coerced workers, and continues to drag their feet at the bargaining table.

We can only win when we stand together in solidarity. Can you take a moment to sign our petition to demand that Trader Joe’s stop union-busting?

I want to thank Social Security Works for the chance to talk to you today, and thank you for fighting with us.

In solidarity,

Maeg Yosef
Trader Joe’s United