A small group of motivated employees made one of the largest multinationals falter: workers at an Amazon warehouse in New York voted overwhelmingly in favor of forming a union, a first in the United States within the company.
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According to a count broadcast online, 2,654 employees ticked “yes” to be represented by the Amazon Labor Union, created almost a year ago, against 2,131 who voted “no”.
When the results were announced, applause rang out among the small crowd gathered for the occasion at the bottom of the building where the counting was organized.
"People have spoken today, they want a union," ALU president Christian Smalls said after the result.
Aaron Novik, who works at an Amazon warehouse in Connecticut and supports the movement by regularly creating new posters, was seized with gleeful disbelief.
"How did they do it?
I do not know.
But people now see that it is possible,”
The wishes of employees always postponed so far
A total of 8,325 workers at the JFK8 warehouse located in the Staten Island district, in a large industrial area, were on the voting list, even if some no longer work at Amazon.
They were called to vote in person in a tent set up in front of the building, from April 25 to 30.
4,852 people slipped a ballot into the ballot box.
The count, carried out by the agency responsible for labor law in the United States (NLRB), began Thursday afternoon.
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Amazon, one of the largest employers in the United States, had so far succeeded in repelling the desires of employees wishing to regroup in the country.
The group also faces two other battles.
On the other side of the street from the JFK8 warehouse, some 1,500 employees of the sorting center called LDJ5 are called upon to vote for or against the creation of another branch of the ALU, from April 25 to 29.
Further south in the country, in Bessemer, Alabama, the national distribution union RWDSU, which employees wanted to join, seemed set for a possible second contested defeat.
Thursday evening, the “no” led with 993 ballots, against 875 “yes”, but there remained 416 so-called “disputed” ballots, which will decide the result.
A hearing must decide in the coming weeks what will be done with these bulletins.