Grape Growers Jittery Over Winery Strike as Harvest Nears Peak

REEDLEY, Calif. â€”  Outside the Christian Brothers winery here, grape grower Don Klassen sits patiently in a red 1950 truck piled high with seven tons of Thompson seedless grapes.

“That’s my livelihood, right there,� the grizzled farmer said, gesturing toward the back of his truck. Klassen is 25th in a line of 30 trucks waiting to dump their perishable cargoes into the winery’s sole operating grape crusher.

“I’ve never seen it this slow,� said Klassen, whose 80-acre vineyard up the road has been supplying grapes to the Christian Brothers since 1958.

The reason for the delay is clearly visible outside the winery’s gates. There, in the 100-degree heat, striking winery workers carry picket signs reading “Unfair to Labor� and “The Lord Giveth, The Christian Brothers Taketh Away.� Managers, office workers and hastily hired replacements are running the plant but seem hard-pressed to keep it operating at capacity.

The strike, which began 2 1/2 weeks ago at Christian Brothers facilities in the Napa Valley and in this town south of Fresno, has spread to five other big wine makers in the Central Valley and is sending shivers throughout the state’s grape-growing regions as the peak harvest season approaches. About 500 employees are out.

Last week the Winery, Distillery and Allied Workers Union threatened to up the ante by pulling its 600 workers out of E & J Gallo, the world’s largest wine maker, which produces 25% of all the wine consumed in the United States and a startling 40% of all the wine made in California.

Gallo declined comment, but industry sources say the family owned company is preparing for a strike with the same single-minded determination that has made its jug wines, Andre champagne, E & J brandy and Bartles & Jaymes wine cooler the best-selling beverages in their respective categories.

“Ernest and Julio don’t put up with any foolishness,� said Kingsburg grape grower Paul Nyberg. “If their workers walk, they’ll have new ones waiting to replace them.�

The Gallo wineries also are considered the most highly automated in the industry.

At peak harvest time, however, delays of even a few days as replacement workers learn the ropes could be devastating to grape growers. “You bet we’re concerned,� said Bill Allison, manager of the Fresno County Farm Bureau. “If this strike proliferates and the wineries can’t handle the crop, we could have a disaster on our hands.�

“Those grapes just can’t sit around for a day or two in this 100-degree weather,� Allison added. “They just won’t hold up.�

Growers are warily eyeing the weather. “If it rains and we can’t get the crops in fast, we’ll get some bunch-rot,� Nyberg said.

As a result, worried growers are pitching in at some of the struck wineries. “It is in the interests of the growers for their crops to be crushed in a timely manner,� noted John Crowe, counsel for Sierra Wine, whose plants in Tulare and Delano have been struck.

“It is a race against time,� added Melvin Ries, an agricultural economist with the California Department of Food and Agriculture in Sacramento. The agency forecasts a grape crush of 2.5 million tons this year, but so far less than 25% of that has been processed.

Recovering Prices

The grape growers’ latest worry comes in a year when prices, battered for the last three years, are recovering somewhat. Thompson seedless grapes, commonly used to make cheap white wine and brandy, are selling for $100 a ton, up from around $70 but still well below the $200-a-ton peak in 1981. The price hike stems from a smaller crop this year and increased demand for wine for use in coolers.

While the Central Valley’s grape growers have ample cause for concern, connoisseurs of fine wines can relax. With the exception of Christian Brothers, the wineries that have been struck--Sierra Wine, Vie-Del, Franzia Brothers, Bronco and Lamont--produce lower-priced jug wines and other bulk wines made by the tank car rather than the barrel.

“We are not talking about the elite wine market; we are talking twist-off caps,� said Robert M. Lieber, a negotiator for the 12-member Winery Employers Assn. and a partner in the San Francisco law firm of Littler, Mendelson, Fastiff & Tichy. Boutique wineries in such prime regions as Napa and Sonoma are not unionized.

Even the low end of the market won’t see much disruption in supply, predicts Jon Frederikson, president of a San Francisco wine-industry consulting firm, Gomberg, Frederikson & Associates. “The industry came through a similar strike six years ago with flying colors,� says Frederikson, who remembers pitching in on a bottling line at Paul Masson while an executive there at the time.

Foreign Competition

Then, the union was striking for higher wages. This time, fringe benefits for the 3,000 union members are at issue. Both sides in the dispute acknowledge that the unionized wineries have been hurt by competition from foreign wine and such non-union operators as Brown-Forman’s California Cooler. But their proposed remedies differ sharply.

Union leaders have offered to accept a package that cuts the $12-an-hour average wage by 75 cents an hour for the first two years of a three-contract, with wages jumping back to their current level in the third.

But employers, arguing that the union proposal fails to provide them with long-term relief, are proposing instead to cut pension contributions and health benefits.

The employers argue that they can cut back on pension contributions because the pension fund has enjoyed big gains as a result of the booming stock market. Union leaders want the stock market gains paid out in higher pensions.

“The employers want to take our money and put it back into their pockets,� charged Robert Fogg, president of the union’s Local 186 in Modesto. “They’re trying to take that money away from retirees who worked side by side with Ernest and Julio and other owners to build those wineries into what they are today.�

Anti-Union Drive Seen

“They’re out to break the union, pure and simple,� added James Zack, a striking maintenance worker at Vie-Del’s plant in Fresno. “We’re not even asking for pay raises.�

The strikers are particularly incensed by the employers’ proposed cutbacks in health insurance. “If they take away health insurance for seasonal workers, one big illness in my family and I’m gone,� said Glenn Anderson, a worker at Christian Brothers’ Reedley plant.

Both sides appear to be digging in for a long period of labor ferment. “I don’t think there will be a quick settlement,� said management negotiator Lieber, the sole spokesman for the wineries. The old contract expired July 31, and talks broke off Aug. 14 after numerous bargaining sessions and the intervention of federal mediator Ruth Carpenter.

The wineries unilaterally put into effect their final contract offer on Aug. 16 and workers struck Christian Brothers two days later. Sierra, Vie-Del, Franzia and Lamont were added last week. Bronco joined the list Saturday. Members of the Winery Employers Assn. that haven’t yet been struck, besides Gallo, include Almaden, Gibson, Charles Krug, Sun Maid, Fromm & Sichel and Midcal.

Union leaders refuse to say which winery might be next. “That’s confidential strike strategy,� Fogg said. And, he insists that “we aren’t trying to hurt the grower� although one rank-and-filer acknowledges: “This is the one time of the year that we’ve got some bargaining power.�

Speculation on Gallo

Union members say leaders appear to be divided on the question of a strike against Gallo. The company is no stranger to labor problems, having beaten back a boycott organized by the United Farm Workers union during the 1970s and emerged even stronger. Today, none of its farm workers are unionized.

“If Gallo could weather a strike--and there is every indication that it could, at least in the short term--the union would be forced to fold up its tent and concede defeat,� one industry observer said.

But a long strike--one, say, lasting more than a month--could take its toll on wine quality and output. “They can tough it out for a while,� said Bob Hartzell, president of the California Assn. of Wine Grape Growers. “But the question is: How many 12- and 14-hour days can those supervisors and managers put in?�