UFCW Local 1262 was
first chartered by the Retail Clerks International Association in
1941. Today it is one of the largest
local unions with some 30,000 members employed by such supermarket giants
as ShopRite, Stop & Shop, Foodtown and
Pathmark, as well as retail leaders like Bograd’s
Furniture and others.
Prior to World War
II retail food workers in the Northern New Jersey and Metro New York area were
employed in “Mom and Pop” food outlets that were small and only employed a
few workers per store. After World
War II, the age of the supermarket and giant food retailers began, as
veterans returning from the War began to take advantage of growth and a
change in lifestyle which fostered many communities and encouraged the
building of larger stores with more employees.
The full effect of
the age of the modern supermarket increased the sale of retail food and in
the 1950s and 1960s many new methods of food merchandising began to change
the complexion of the retail food industry.
Modern technology
has always entered the supermarket industry at a fast pace. The introduction
of the universal product code (UPC), which is now applied to almost every
item of merchandise sold in the United States, had its beginning in the
supermarket industry, and in particular, in the State of New Jersey and in
UFCW Local 1262.
Since then, the
growth of giant food merchandisers has grown significantly, year by year
with the face of the modern supermarket ever changing to meet customers’
needs.
To protect the
rights of individual employees and to see to it that their progress in
their working careers parallels the growth of the companies they work for,
UFCW Local 1262 regularly negotiates pacesetting new contracts that take
the rights of individual workers and put them into contract language that
ensures equal treatment for all in the workplace.
The 30,000 current
members of UFCW Local 1262 are joined each day by new workers who have come
into the Local Union, either by gaining employment with a Unionized employer, or by being part of successful
efforts to organize non-union employers.
