Danny DeVito Is Calling For A Nabisco Boycott. Here's Why
Danny DeVito has weighed in on the Nabisco strike. "Support Nabisco workers striking for humane working hours, fair pay, outsourcing jobs," he wrote on Twitter. "NO CONTRACTS. NO SNACKS."
Nabisco is a subsidiary of Mondelez International, which produces familiar snacks like Oreos, Fig Newtons, and Chips Ahoy! As Eater reports, 200-plus workers at Nabisco's Portland-based bakery went on strike on August 10 over proposed contract changes that would eliminate the overtime accrued for weekend work or shifts longer than eight hours. Vice adds that health plan benefits were also slated to be reduced.
On Twitter, support seems strong for the worker's strike and brand boycott. As of publication, DeVito's Tweet has received 148,000 likes and 35,000 retweets. And DeVito's vocal support of Nabisco workers should come as no surprise. In 2016, The Guardian featured a picture of DeVito endorsing former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. In the 2020 Presidential Election cycle, The Hill reported that DeVito's devotion for the liberal democratic politics of Sanders held firm.
However, as Mondelez owns Nabisco, the boycott might have to scale up to meet the level of the mega corporation. In an organizational chart shared by Jason Barnes on Twitter, Mondelez is shown to also own the likes of Philadelphia Cream Cheese, Toblerone, and Tang.
The state of the Nabisco strike right now
Since the initial walk out in Portland in early August, the strike has spread to other states. On August 19, Today wrote that similar demonstrations were seen in Chicago, Richmond, Virginia, and Aurora, Colorado.
In a statement released August 20, Mondelez claims that no changes to the health insurance structure are being suggested. However, among their list of offerings to the employee union, they did include "revised overtime rules, paying premiums to employees on [the] 6th and 7th day who work their scheduled hours during the week." This does what the union is complaining about, albeit in a very different language. It removes the priority of overtime pay from previous days in the week, such as working 12-hour shifts on a Monday or a weekend date like Sunday. Such a restructure to pay would effectively reduce one's annual salary by thousands of dollars while also keeping the unwanted long shifts in place. This, employees maintain, is unfair — especially when Market Watch writes that Mondelez doubled its profits in the previous financial quarter.
Neither side seems ready to budge, meaning that Oreo supplies may dwindle long before any boycott gains nationwide traction. "The lines require skilled labor and they just can't run those lines without our union members in there," Keith Bragg local president of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers Local 358 guild in Richmond, Virginia told the Richmond-Times Dispatch.