Smithfield Foods has hit back at an advertising campaign by The United Food and Commercial Workers International Union aimed at protesting conditions at the company’s North Carolina plant.
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The ad campaign is being run in the Washington region because it is among the largest consumer of Smithfield products. The media blitz is called ‘Buy Better Than Smithfield’.
However in a statement today, Smithfield said the union was giving consumers false information about Smithfield Foods. “The union also is refusing to let the employees vote by secret ballot on whether they want to be represented by the union,” the statement said.
Dennis Pittman, Smithfield’s director of corporate communications, said: “These misleading and deliberately inflammatory ads are a continuation of the union’s pressure tactics against Smithfield. The UFCW’s real motive is to avoid a free, fair, secret-ballot election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board in which employees decide whether they want to be represented by the union.”
Smithfield said it has repeatedly offered to schedule such an election.
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By GlobalData“The company has offered to pay half the cost for an independent, outside election observer, such as President Jimmy Carter’s Center in Atlanta. But the UFCW refuses to agree to the election,” the statement added.
“Instead, the UFCW is giving false information to consumers about the plant’s safety record,” Pittman said. “These tactics can only hurt the employees who work there. We call on the UFCW to stop its pressure campaign. Let the employees vote.”
