Striking Sobeys warehouse workers picket outside Safeway in Marda Loop as protest moves to grocery stores

Sobeys warehouse workers picket outside a Safeway in Marda Loop on Saturday, Oct. 18.

A group of striking Sobeys warehouse workers took their picket line to the store Saturday.

Around 40 to 50 warehouse workers picketed outside a Safeway store in Marda Loop.

Safeway and Sobeys are both owned by the Empire Company.

Preston Quintin, a business agent for Teamsters 987, which represents the striking workers, said strikers are trying to bring more attention to the public about what is going on.

“This fight was basically started by the company,” Quintin said. “They locked out their employees. They made one offer and that was it.

“And the employees made three offers back to them --less than 25 cents an hour difference from their previous offer -- and they said flat-out no to all three of them (counter-offers).”

The workers were given a 72-hour lockout notice on Sept. 15 from the Sobeys Retail Support Centre in Rocky View County.

Day 30

Saturday, Quintin said, was the 30th day of the lockout.

“At the end of the day, this is about fairness and trying to make sure that people who go out there, who work an honest job, can afford to live,” Quintin said.

“We don’t want to get to a place where people are working full time and can’t support themselves and are relying on things like government assistance and all that when the employer that they work for could pay them a little bit more and make sure that they’re taken care of and don’t need to rely on those types of things.”

Last week, Quintin said strikers outside the warehouse in Rocky View County were concerned for their safety after being spat at and having a number of vehicles try to drive through the line when workers blocked them.

Strike protocols allow members to stop vehicles coming in and out of the property for minutes at a time.

“We’ve had members who’ve actually been hit by trucks,” said Quintin.

“We had an incident last week where there was literally a driver who got out, he spat on one of our members and the security just stood there and they just filmed it.

“They didn’t try to intervene,” he added. “They just let it happen.”

CTV News reached out to the Empire Company for comment earlier this week but hasn’t heard back.

Quintin said picketers would be visiting other stores around the city throughout the day Saturday.

The strikers are asking customers to boycott Empire Company-owned stores and companies the Rocky View facility services where they can, including Sobeys, Safeway, FreshCo, and IGA.

“We want them (the public) to see this isn’t a bunch of people trying to be greedy or trying to push some sort of outcome that’s unreasonable,” Quintin said. “This is just about fairness and trying to do the right thing here.”

With files from CTV’s Tyson Fedor and Tyler Barrow