Amazon workers at seven US facilities walked off the job early on Thursday during the holiday shopping rush, aiming to pressure the retailer into contract talks with their union.
Warehouse workers in cities including New York, Atlanta and San Francisco are taking part in the “largest” strike against Amazon, said the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, which represents about 10,000 workers at 10 of the firm’s facilities.
“What we’re doing is historic,” said Leah Pensler, a warehouse worker at DCK6 in San Francisco in a press release announcing the strike. “We are fighting against a vicious union-busting campaign, and we are going to win.”
Teamsters locals are also starting picket lines at hundreds of Amazon sites around the US in support of the strike, the Teamsters said, and argued Amazon warehouse workers and delivery drivers have the legal right to honor those picket lines.
The company, however, said it does not expect any effect on its operations during one of the busiest times of the year.
Unions represent only about 1% of the workforce of Amazon, one of the largest companies in the US by market value, and it has multiple locations in several metro areas.
The union had given Amazon a 15 December deadline to begin negotiations and warehouse workers had recently voted to authorize a strike.
“If your package is delayed during the holidays, you can blame Amazon’s insatiable greed,” the Teamsters’ general president, Sean O’Brien, said late on Wednesday.
“We gave Amazon a clear deadline to come to the table and do right by our members. They ignored it. This strike is on them.”
The retailer’s shares were trading 1.5% higher in premarket hours, a sign that investors do not expect a big disruption from the strike.
The Teamsters have “intentionally misled the public” and “threatened, intimidated and attempted to coerce” employees and third-party drivers to join them, an Amazon spokesperson said on Thursday.
Observers said Amazon was unlikely to come to the table to bargain as that could open the door to more union actions. The corporation employs more than 1.5 million people globally and has said it prefers direct relationships with workers.
Still, the company has responded to recent organization efforts with legal challenges. Amazon has filed objections with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) over a 2022 union vote in Staten Island, alleging bias among agency officials.
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In August 2024, the National Labor Relations Board rejected those objections but Amazon won a temporary pause in October on the board issuing a bargaining order pending Amazon’s appeals.
The NLRB has also issued complaints involving Amazon refusing to bargain with the Teamsters as a joint employer of delivery drivers in California and ordered another rerun union election at an Amazon warehouse in Bessemer, Alabama.
Amazon also challenged the constitutionality of the NLRB in a September federal lawsuit. Earlier this year, the company announced a $2.1bn investment to raise pay for fulfillment and transportation employees in the US, increasing base wages for employees by at least $1.50 to around $22 per hour, a roughly 7% increase.
Reuters contributed to this story.