The GCIU General Board endorsed the AFL-CIO boycott of goods in packages printed by Graphic Packaging Corp. (GPC) after the company, which is owned and controlled by the Coors family, locked out 429 members of the Paper, Allied-Industrial, Chemical and Energy Workers (PACE).

The lockout began on July 27, 2002, at GPC’s Kalamazoo, Mich., plant after workers rejected the company’s demands for the union members to work as many as 16 hours per day, seven days a week. At the time of the lockout, the company also was demanding that workers perform their shifts on all holidays. According to PACE, Coors Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Coors later relented on the Christmas holiday.

The company also wants to pass on health insurance costs of as much as $3,600 a year for some employees and establish a two-tier pension system, with new hires’ pensions 24 percent to 32 percent lower than current employees.

PACE Vice Pres. Bill Gibbons said the union went “the extra mile” to try to negotiate with GPC and the Coors family. Charging Coors with a blatant attempt at union-busting as skilled union members were replaced with inexperienced workers, Gibbons said: “The Graphic Packaging workers in Kalamazoo are being punished by Coors because they have engaged in their legal right of collective bargaining and rejected the company’s unreasonable demands. . . . This conduct is socially reprehensible and could set an anti-worker, anti-family precedent.”

The boycott includes Coors Light, Coors Original, Coors Extra Gold, Killians, Zima, Blue Moon, Keystone Light, and Coors Non-Alcoholic.

General Mills products included in the boycott include Wheaties, Cheerios, Total, Chex, Lucky Charms, Trix, Cocoa Puffs, Cocoa Crisp, Golden Grahams, Cinnamon Grahams, Oatmeal Crisp, Honey Nut Cluster, Harmony, Kix, Nesquick, Reeses Puffs, Raisin Nut Bran, Basic 4, Count Chocula, Frankenberry, and Cinnamon and French Toast Crunch.

Quaker Oats products covered by the boycott include Rice-A-Roni and Pasta Roni. The boycott also includes Kraft’s Oscar Mayer bacon.

In addition to boycotting these products, the union is asking union families to write or telephone GPC officials and GPC customers to demand that the company negotiate a fair settlement with its union workers.

Contact:

GPC CEO Jeff Coors:
Graphic Packaging Corp.
4455 Table Mountain Dr.
Golden, Colo. 80403
(303) 215-4600

Coors CEO Peter Coors:
(303) 279-6565

General Mills CEO Stephen Sanger:
(763) 764-7600

Kraft CEO Louis Camilleri:
(847) 646-2000

Quaker Oats Chairman Robert Morrison:
1-800-421-2444