Apple Finalizes First Retail Union Contract With Maryland Store

Apple has reached a provisional agreement with its first unionized retail store in Towson, Maryland, marking a significant development in the company's labor relations (via Bloomberg).

apple townson apples website
Apple has agreed to a tentative collective bargaining agreement with retail employees at its Towson store, the first of its kind for the company's operations in the United States. The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers (IAM) Coalition of Organized Retail Employees (IAM CORE) announced the deal on Friday, detailing improvements in pay, work-life balance, and job security. This agreement is now pending a vote by the store's approximately 85 employees on August 6.

The proposed three-year contract includes an average pay raise of 10%, with increases in starting pay for 80% of job classifications. The agreement aims to improve work-life balance through enhanced scheduling protections for both full-time and part-time employees. The deal also includes limits on the use of contracted employees, a new transparency and accountability procedure for disciplinary action, and an updated severance clause to provide financial protection in the event of layoffs. The tentative agreement maintains all current benefits and includes a commitment to negotiate any future additions.

The Towson Apple store made headlines in June 2022 when its employees voted to join IAM, becoming the first Apple retail store in the United States to unionize. Since then, IAM CORE has been in negotiations with Apple management, with discussions starting in January 2023. Frustration over the slow pace of negotiations led to a strike authorization vote in May 2024. The Towson store agreement may set a precedent for labor negotiations at other Apple retail locations and could potentially influence unionization efforts across the company's 271 U.S. stores.

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Top Rated Comments

WarmWinterHat Avatar
8 months ago

And the extra costs they incur because of this will be passed on to their customers.
So people should have crap wages so you can have a cheaper iDevice?

I'm not talking about you specifically, or even Apple, but I don't like the idea that we should have a underclass of people working for menial wages just to keep stuff cheap. In addition, the companies can take a profit cut for better wages, and would, if customers voted with their wallet and demanded it.

All that said, retail is retail, and will never be a great job.
Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)
DownUnderDan Avatar
8 months ago

And the extra costs they incur because of this will be passed on to their customers.
Where as Tim's 40 to 80 million annual take home or the 400K+ annual of other exectutives at Apple are presumably not reflected at all in the cost of Apple products we purchase. Its just the hourly workers that work retail that are the problem. If you are concerned about the bottom line, ask Tim to take 1 million off his pay annualy and give it to everyone who is an employee at an Apple store and then every store member can have a decent payrise with no impact on the customer.
Score: 13 Votes (Like | Disagree)
NT1440 Avatar
8 months ago

Start your own company, hire thousands, pay people $50/hr and show these companies how it should be done.
Human dignity is more important to me than the religious adherence to an exploitative economic model.

That’s all you guys need to know about my thoughts, before I get yet another warning from the mods for responding to topics brought up that are “political” in nature.

I’m going back to work, have fun guys.
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
WarmWinterHat Avatar
8 months ago

Artificially inflated wages hurt as many people as they help. Witness the number of restaurants shutting down in some states due to an increased minimum wage and the ones still in business forced to raise their prices to cover for it. The costs are always passed on to customers. It sucks for people with the low wages but just wait until AI really starts eliminating jobs in the not-too-distant future - people will really have something to complain about.
If a business can't afford to pay a decent wage, they are a bad business idea and deserve to fail; restaurants included. Wages are being artificially deflated, not inflated, for the shareholders. I'm a shareholder, and still think it's crap.

As for AI, there are going to ton of negative business repercussions when they realize that AI doesn't do 4/5 of what was promised by the likes of silicon-valley grifters such as Sam Altman.
Score: 10 Votes (Like | Disagree)
peneaux Avatar
8 months ago
I worked for a union before. It’s great when you’re starting and you don’t have much experience. But after you get some to show in your resume, you can negotiate yourself and go to where you’re more valued.

After I left the union, I got a 35% pay upgrade. Less BS from the union too.

For the young ones; don’t leave your job before finding another. Now and then look for options. It’s better to negotiate another job when you are still employed.

I do OnlyFans on the side but curvy trans girls don’t have that much demand these days.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
NT1440 Avatar
8 months ago

This!

Walk into a Home Depot or Lowe's, at least near me, and you will find ZERO manned checkout lanes! Every lane was closed and only the self-checkouts were open with a single employee watching the 6 self-checkouts. Convenience stores and supermarkets are mirroring this experience.

You can price your job right out of existence.
Yes, it’s the low wages workers who forced that, not TWO decades of an industry (retail automations) doing everything possible to sell their products promising to minimize headcount and maximize profits.

Some of you people keep pointing at the natural results of capitalism as somehow indicative of *workers* overstepping. I truly don’t get it.

Always blame the workers, ignore the $54 trillion wealth transfer happening under your feet since the last great theft (we call that recession).
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)