The War on Warehouse Employment

Although you may not have noticed it, for the past year or so we’ve begun to see the first stirrings of a union-sponsored smear campaign aimed at the commercial warehouse industry. Every so often a news story would appear that when examined for its origins could always be traced back to unions and their allies.

The goal appears to be to create in the minds of the public and policymakers that warehouse workers are oppressed, badly paid and poorly treated. Of course, this means they require rescue and protection by the government and unions.

The charges leveled at the warehouse industry are that we pay poorly, use temporary workers from staffing agencies to avoid the threat of unionization, and offer little more than unrewarding jobs where employees face no chance for professional advancement or improvement of their skills and future earnings. In this picture, we are the 1%, exploiting the 99%.

Let’s look at the reality. IWLA’s approximately 500 warehouse member companies are incredibly diverse, as is the industry. They range in size from nationwide and international firms to smaller regional operations. Many of them use full-time employees heavily and some of them are governed by collective bargaining agreements.

Warehouse companies do not use temp staffing agencies or temporary and part-time workers to avoid union organizing or paying employee benefits. In fact, it would be impractical and expensive beyond reason to attempt to do so given the sheer expense involved and the fact that the temporary staffing firms are subject to the same state and federal wage and labor laws as are other employers.

When our warehouse members do use temporary workers or staffing companies, it is either because of the seasonal nature of their business, or in the case of employee staffing companies, it may be so that they can outsource personnel management functions to allow their management can concentrate on their core operational strengths.

The nature of the third-party warehouse logistics business is such that this work is performed on a contract basis to meet a particular need, which may be temporary or ad hoc, and in some cases is highly seasonal. We don’t need to tell DC Velocity’s readers that retailers who needed additional distribution services during the Christmas shopping season don't require the same level of service when the holidays end.

Although some warehouse work is handled by entry level employees, the range of professional disciplines and opportunities is broad. Warehouse work is no longer largely a matter of carrying boxes around. Today’s warehouse operation requires the knowledge and abilities of people in IT, industrial engineering, operations supervision, and transportation and compliance management.

It also is an industry that boasts unprecedented mobility and a career ladder open to those who choose to make warehouse work a career instead of a student summer job or a stop along the way to other employment. If you think I am exaggerating, just ask IWLA Past Chairman Jere Van Puffelen, CLP, who rose from the warehouse floor to become President of Prism Team Services, Danville, CA.

We know that those who work in the logistics industry are aware of many of these facts, and we hope you will join us in speaking up when lies about our industry are being spread by those with ulterior motives and adherents to an ugly ideology.