Teamsters launch effort to stem growth of nonunion commercial movers

With competitors gaining, the union and the commercial movers that use its members unveil an advertising and political campaign to discourage the hiring of lesser-paid rivals.

A new offensive has been launched in the labor war that has come to the commercial moving industry.

Teamsters Local 814, along with their employers in the commercial-moving industry and other local labor organizations, began an advertising blitz Monday and released a letter from elected officials to discourage businesses from hiring nonunion or pseudo-union commercial movers.

Lawmakers cannot prevent companies from using any mover they want, but public pressure has worked before: In 2012, Mount Sinai Hospital reversed its decision to hire a commercial mover that did not use the Teamsters after Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito publicly referred to the newly formed Local 1212 as a "union in name only." The Teamsters and their allies have complained for several years about groups forming with the veneer of traditional unions but not the pay and benefits packages that union members typically enjoy.

There is no lobbying nor legislative effort underway, though. A spokesman for the union declined to share the budget for the campaign, which includes print and online advertisements in Crain's and The Real Deal.

Signers of the letter released Monday include Rep. Jerrold Nadler, Public Advocate Letitia James, Assemblyman Dan Quart, state Sen. Adriano Espaillat, and the borough presidents of Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx. Twelve members of the City Council also signed the one-page letter, which notes that the Teamsters local is the only commercial moving union recognized by the AFL-CIO, the Greater New York Building and Construction Trades Council and the Central Labor Council. The correspondence paints other movers as unreliable, and touted the three-year-old coalition Moving Forward, which is funding the campaign launched Monday.

Moving Forward's members are also contacting hundreds of building owners and managers across the city by mail and by sending representatives directly to their buildings and real estate companies, a spokesman said.

The Teamsters and the politicians who signed the letter are ideologically aligned on workers rights' and wages, and the union provides endorsements and other campaign support to many officials, which makes it easier to recruit their support for efforts such as the one that launched Monday.

For many years, companies in Class A office buildings in the city only used union labor. But some of them started to use movers that employ freshly-hatched unions not affiliated with the AFL-CIO or the Construction Trades.

The Teamsters plan on sending members to engage directly with "hundreds" of building owners and real estate managers to spread the word on their effort.

Moving Forward letter

Source: Crains New York