Cumberland Packing, the owner of Butter Buds, is a Corporate Business and an employer, not a gentle philanthrope. Their recent actions have thrown hundreds of their Brooklyn New York employees out of work - and they are moving their production to Mexico! How about Cory Mason and John Dickert pack up and move to Mexico!
Brooklyn NY - January 9, 2016
Natividad Sanchez, 40, has worked for Cumberland Packing, the Brooklyn-based company that makes Sweet’N Low, for 19 years. She makes $13.29 an hour.
Sometime soon, she will lose her job, as the Sweet'N Low maker — one of New York City’s last big manufacturers — closes its manufacturing and packaging facilities in Brooklyn, a development first reported by POLITICO New York on Friday.
Steven Eisenstadt, the company's president and CEO, said the company now felt comfortable closing its manufacturing operation because, for the first time in years, the manufacturing sector is stabilizing in New York City, and there might actually be other jobs for the laid-off workers.
But the union representing 320 workers at the Sweet N’Low facility sees things differently.
According to Louis Mark Carotenuto, the president of UFCW Local 2013, the union had been engaged in contract negotiations with the company since September. And at no point in those negotiations did the company, which has received more than $1.6 million in state subsidies, mention that it was thinking of moving manufacturing out of Brooklyn.
“They never brought it up once,” said Carotenuto. “And that’s what really annoyed us.”
At Sweet'N Low itself, most of the unionized workers make less than $15 an hour, according to the union.
Sanchez, a Dominican immigrant and mother of two, said she wasn’t sure where she would work next. But she was more worried about some of her colleagues.
“There are people who have been working there for 40 years, and don’t know what they’re going to do," she said.
Cumberland Packing, the owner of Butter Buds, is a Corporate Business and an employer, not a gentle philanthrope. Their recent actions have thrown hundreds of their Brooklyn New York employees out of work - and they are moving their production to Mexico! How about Cory Mason and John Dickert pack up and move to Mexico!
ReplyDeleteBrooklyn NY - January 9, 2016
Natividad Sanchez, 40, has worked for Cumberland Packing, the Brooklyn-based company that makes Sweet’N Low, for 19 years. She makes $13.29 an hour.
Sometime soon, she will lose her job, as the Sweet'N Low maker — one of New York City’s last big manufacturers — closes its manufacturing and packaging facilities in Brooklyn, a development first reported by POLITICO New York on Friday.
Steven Eisenstadt, the company's president and CEO, said the company now felt comfortable closing its manufacturing operation because, for the first time in years, the manufacturing sector is stabilizing in New York City, and there might actually be other jobs for the laid-off workers.
But the union representing 320 workers at the Sweet N’Low facility sees things differently.
According to Louis Mark Carotenuto, the president of UFCW Local 2013, the union had been engaged in contract negotiations with the company since September. And at no point in those negotiations did the company, which has received more than $1.6 million in state subsidies, mention that it was thinking of moving manufacturing out of Brooklyn.
“They never brought it up once,” said Carotenuto. “And that’s what really annoyed us.”
At Sweet'N Low itself, most of the unionized workers make less than $15 an hour, according to the union.
Sanchez, a Dominican immigrant and mother of two, said she wasn’t sure where she would work next. But she was more worried about some of her colleagues.
“There are people who have been working there for 40 years, and don’t know what they’re going to do," she said.