A Decade Later, BJ&B Unionists Make History Again
Ever since student activists first formed USAS in the ’90s, apparel corporations and college administrators insisted it was impossible to produce our schools’ clothes in union factories that pay living wages. It’s time to officially put that excuse to rest.
A decade ago, workers began organizing a union at BJ&B, the Dominican Republic factory making Nike and Reebok caps for U.S. universities. USAS and BJ&B workers struggled together through a series of unprecedented victories and devastating losses. Yesterday, the New York Times announced that former BJ&B unionists are making history again: At the Alta Gracia factory, the courageous women who led the union efforts at BJ&B are finally making university apparel with a strong union and living wages!
Celebrate this major step forward: share the New York Times article, and make a donation to USAS! Your support is crucial to continue the struggle to make every apparel corporation source from union factories and pay a fair price to workers.
In 2003, after 20 BJ&B workers leading the union effort were fired, USAS launched a campaign targeting Nike and Adidas/Reebok, the main brands sourcing from the factory. Not only did workers win their jobs back, but they won a historic union contract with wages and benefits that the New York Times called “unheard of.” But the victory was short lived. Brands began systematically pulling out their business and moving to non-union sweatshops, flagrantly violating universities’ apparel codes of conduct. In 2007 Nike announced the closure of BJ&B – punishing the factory for improving labor standards. USAS and BJ&B workers’ union, FEDOTRAZONAS, fought to bring the good union jobs back to over 2,000 workers left jobless in Villa Altagracia, the community devasted by BJ&B’s closing.
Now, after a decade of campaigns by garment workers and USAS targeting apparel brands, Knights Apparel – Nike’s largest competitor in the collegiate apparel market – has agreed to open the new factory in Villa Altagracia, hire back all of the BJ&B union leaders, recognize their union and pay a fair price so that the union can bargain for living wages. The apparel will be sold in bookstores under the brand name Alta Gracia.
Let’s celebrate this important breakthrough: spread the word, and make a contribution to sustain our movement.
I am proud to be a member of this organization that has fought alongside workers in the Dominican Republic for a decade. What’s happening in Villa Altagracia is yet another step for USAS and garment workers in changing the university apparel industry. Together we’ll keep working towards the day when all university apparel will be produced in union factories where workers can collectively bargain for living wages.
Congratulations to every generation of USASers who fought in solidarity with BJ&B workers!
The struggle continues,
Casey Sweeney
Cornell Organization for Labor Action
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Alta Gracia Plant Shows Fair Practices Possible in Apparel
by James Parks, Jul 19, 2010
The first-known apparel factory in the developing world to pay a living wage is operating in Villa Altagracia, a small impoverished town in the Dominican Republic. For the first time, the 120 workers at the factory will be paid enough to support themselves and their families.
The factory and brand, Alta Gracia, is named after the town and is owned by Spartanburg, S.C.-based Knights Apparel, the leading supplier of college-logo apparel to U.S. universities, according to the Collegiate Licensing Co. Alta Gracia pays the workers about three-and-a-half times the average pay of the country’s apparel workers—and allows workers to join a union without interference.
Knights CEO Joseph Bozich tells The New York Times:
We’re hoping to prove that doing good can be good business, that they’re not mutually exclusive.
For two years, Knights worked closely with the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC), a group of 186 universities that press factories making college-logo apparel to treat workers fairly. Scott Nova, the consortium’s executive director, says the WRC reached an agreement with Knights last year to create a model apparel plant, which pays a living wage, is neutral in union elections and allows union organizers full access to the plant.
Nova says:
This is a victory for the student activists and the sweatshop activists in the labor movement who have been advocating for better conditions in the apparel industry. This factory is a powerful symbol of what is possible.
He says it shows that the present model of low-wage, anti-union, poor conditions apparel sweatshops is not one we have to live with—it’s the choice of the employers.
The workers formed a union and held the founding meeting last month. The AFL-CIO Solidarity Center assisted the workers in forming a union and establishing labor standards at the factory.
The factory already has orders to make T-shirts and sweatshirts for bookstores at 400 American universities. The T-shirts will cost about $18 retail—the same as brands like Nike and Adidas. United Students Against Sweatshops plans to distribute fliers at college bookstores urging freshmen to buy the Alta Gracia shirts.
The T-shirts will be marketed with tags depicting Alta Gracia employees and the message: “Your purchase will change our lives.” The tags also will contain the WRC endorsement, the first-ever for the group. Knights is preparing a video for bookstores to show and a Web documentary, both highlighting the improvements in workers’ lives.
The factory previously was owned by BJ&B, a Korean company that supplied baseball caps and other university logo apparel to Nike and Reebok. The plant closed with no notice in 2007, throwing hundreds of workers, mainly women, out of work.
Nova says the main benefit of the factory is that it gives hope to the workers:
It’s the difference between life and misery. Now they can make enough to support a family.
Tags: College Apparel Industry, Global Economy, International Solidarity, Student Labor Activism, United Students Against Sweatshops
