SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — After 62 days on strike, Teamsters drivers and helpers at the airline catering company Flying Food Group here at San Francisco International Airport returned to work with a significant pay raise and a year of “retro” — back pay they would have gotten if the company had settled when the contract ran out nearly three years ago. The workers, members of Teamsters Local 2785, pushed back an attempt by the company to impose inferior health insurance.
It was a tough fight. The company hired scabs and used managers as drivers and refused to seriously negotiate up until the bitter end. But the workers stayed united, staffing picket lines throughout. Not one worker crossed. “The workers went back stronger, with pride,” Teamsters Local 2785 Business Agent Apollo Wallace told the Militant. “They know what it means to be union.”