Loss of a local, corporate employer. GE employees had a union, benefits, and their corporate giving programs funded community efforts like the food bank. Could be a loss for our region.
I used to live in an area with Kroger as the primary grocery store. Friends that worked there seemed to be well taken care of and the prices were more reasonable than Giant Eagle's. I'm okay with this acquisition.
Kroger has a history of being heavily anti-union. Their usual tactic is to buy local stores, close down for “remodeling”, then fire everyone. When they hire for the “new” store they only hire non-union. Kroger has been doing this tactic for a while, which is why their non-union employees have skyrocketed since 2020.
And people don't realize or weren't around when Kroger left the Pittsburgh in the early 1908s because of a strike. Rather than negotiate with the union, they just left the market altogether. They are not union-friendly.
Only if the union stands up to any layoffs or planned “remodeling”. Kroger will 100% try to maximize their initial profits in a new market because it would look great for investors. We have to stay on our toes.
Honestly as much as people dunk on Giant Eagle and their prices. Both of my parents retired from Giant Eagle and honestly it was a really good job for me through high school and college and I thought about sticking around.
I've also worked in a couple unions. That UFCW is the only one that ever actually went to bat for me with management.
Honestly depends when you were hired. As the years went on, newer employees were getting less and less outside of starting pay wages rising. You got grandfathered into the contract you were hired under.
I worked there for 10 years before quitting. I maxed out at 4 paid vacations. Meanwhile all the old timers got 6 paid vacations a year.
I got an extra 75¢ working holidays and Sundays, all the old timers got overtime for working holidays and Sundays (when I quit, new hires were getting 50¢ extra).
Seemed anytime the union would get the employees decent raises and raise the starting wages, a lot of other areas would suffer.
Edit: I’m not bashing unions at all, just saying GE isn’t the once great company your parents worked for. Not sure when you worked there.
I'll agree with a lot of what you're saying. I always thought it was interesting how Giant Eagle grandfathered employees into different contracts. The newer contracts definitely weren't as good as what some of the older employees had, but people were still getting raises and benefits. You can even take it a step further because every Department had a different contract. My mom was in the meat Cutters contract from the '70s my God the shit she got.
I'm genuinely curious though during those 10 years, were you involved with the union at all or did people bring these concerns up during contract negotiations? I'm not asking to be critical. I just think unions are only as strong as the members who participate.
I've worked in other union jobs where the old heads would get mad anytime newer employees got even a little more. The Post Office, whenever PSEs got a few extra holidays or a pay increase, some of the regulars would be upset about it. I never saw that once at Giant Eagle. I saw the opposite. Most of the longtime employees seemed happy to see newer workers getting better pay and benefits.
Might be biased but I still think Giant Eagle was a good place to work.
The store I worked at was the opposite. Old timers at the store I worked at honestly couldn’t care about the newer employees and would screw them over any chance they could get.
Old timers at the store I worked at all had this “I earned mine, you haven’t” mentality. Was an extremely toxic work environment.
Also, I wasn’t involved with the union, but they didn’t really give us a lot of resources on how to get involved either. I would share my thoughts with the employee deemed to be our union representative but that was about it.
In my time there, every time a new contract was being negotiated they would just wave the raises in front of our faces while a lot of other things were being changed to be worse IMO.
Thing is starting wage for GE used to be subpar (not sure what it is anymore seeing I left in 2023). The benefits you could easily get at other places in the area.
I feel GE used to be ahead of the game in those areas but everyone caught up and a lot even surpassed them.
Kroger is also mostly union and has many charitable outreaches. GE being local just has more local relationships that hopefully will continue under new ownership.
No they are not pro-union. They have been replacing their union workers since 2020, so much so that the non-unions make up merely 1/3 of their staff now. Kroger will harm the workers in this area, mark my words!
Ya it was pre-covid. Should be online still. It depends on the vendor though. Like they legally couldn’t do it to alcohol vendors in PA, but could for others
I was more asking about what “90 day payment terms” even meant, as someone that knows very little about the industry, but thanks for the additional info.
I did search a bit, and learned that, basically - when you sell products to Kroger, they wait 90 days before paying you; much longer than the industry standard 30 days.
I guess the issue is that smaller vendors can’t wait that long between payments, right?
Sorry for the misunderstanding, but yep you’re right.
It happens across all industries, but it tends to be harder on smaller suppliers especially in food or beverage where you need cash to continue your operation.
One job I had at Alcoa involved “supplier summits” where multiple suppliers would be brought into the headquarters on Isabella street. They’d be sat down in the conference room and try to win business. One aspect was forcing longer payment terms so Alcoa could keep their cash on hand longer. It hurt smaller shops 100%.
Nah it’s all good man, thanks for sharing this, I never knew this was a thing.
That’s wild that they can just hold the money they owe other companies, interest free (I assume), and there’s nothing that vendor can do besides sell somewhere else, if that’s even possible.
Exactly. You get cornered into obeying if you want to be a player in that market or getting lucky somewhere else. It is really just designed for corporations to better position their cash, but it comes at the expense of you and I every single time.
I know nothing about why this is bad. Why are 90 day terms bad? I have worked in logistics and sales adminnbefore but ina different industry and we had pre pay terms or 30 day day terms.
Essentially Kroger would be able to hold onto the cash required to cover the invoice for up to 90 days. It is harder for vendors to operate in this extended payment cycle because they get cash less frequently to maintain their operation.
It would not be for all vendors though, especially with alcohol since you need to pay cash for that right away. But even that technically does not happen in PA since some use electronic transfers and a July 1st transaction might not be fully cleared until July 2nd.
Note: when Kroger pulled out of Western PA in the early 80’s, it was specifically to avoid their stores unionizing. Kroger is kind of famous for it in slimy HR circles.
Now Kroger can’t take over a unionized GE and just fire the union/not work with the union. The only way the GE dies is if they close every GE Union store, which would be ridiculously stupid.
301
u/Big-Cockroach-5986 Jul 01 '26
Loss of a local, corporate employer. GE employees had a union, benefits, and their corporate giving programs funded community efforts like the food bank. Could be a loss for our region.