The Kroger Co.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Aug 31, 1951

95 N.L.R.B. 1513 (N.L.R.B. 1951)

THE KROGER COMPANY 1513
However, we shall make no final unit determination at this time,
but shall be guided in part by the desires of these employees as
expressed in the election hereinafter directed. If a majority vote for
the Petitioner, they will be taken to have indicated their desire to
constitute a separate appropriate unit.
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
volume.]
THE KROGER Co. (INDIANAPOLIS BRANCH) and MEAT CUTTERS & PACK-
INGHOUSE WORKERS UNION LOCAL No. 167, AMALGAMATED MEAT
CUTTERS & BUTCHER WORKMEN OF NORTH AMERICA, AFL, PETI-
TIONER. Case No. 35-UA-1087. August 31, 1951
Decision and Direction of Election
Upon a petition duly filed a hearing was held before Robert Volger,
hearing officer. The hearing officer's rulings made at the hearing
are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the Act, the Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-member
panel [Members Houston, Reynolds, and Styles].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the Act.
2. The Petitioner is the certified collective bargaining representa-
tive of the employees claimed in the petition to constitute a unit
appropriate for the purposes of authorizing the Petitioner to make
a union security agreement.
3. The Petitioner has made an approprate allegation showing that
30 percent or more of the employees in the claimed unit desire to
authorize the Petitioner to make an agreement requiring membership
in the Petitioner as a condition of employment.
4. The appropriate unit :
The Petitioner seeks a union-security authorization election among
all the Employer's meat department employees involved in the consent
election in Case No. 35-RC-466, whereby approximately 95 employees
from the 41 unorganized stores within the Employer's Indianapolis
Branch were combined with a bargaining unit comprised of approx-
imately 140 employees from another 35 stores to enlarge the then
existing bargaining unit to one "coextensive with the territory of the
Indianapolis Branch of the Employer." However, the Petitioner re-
quested dismissal of the petition on the ground that the employees
involved had authorized the Petitioner to make a union-security agree-
95 NLRB No. 206.
1514 'DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
merit by indicating their desire to be incorporated with a bargaining
unit which was at the time of the election covered by a contract con-
taining a duly authorized union-security provision, that the branch-
wide unit constitutes the. appropriate bargaining unit, and that any
further authorization election is therefore unnecessary. We find no
merit in these contentions.
The contract in effect. at the time of the election and the current
contract, which was executed after the issuance of the certification in
Case No. 35-RC-466, expressly provided that the union-security pro-
-visions. therein should apply, to employees other than those included
within the unit who had authorized those provisions only "if and when
a `Union Shop' is authorized by a vote of the employees as required
by the Labor Management Relations Act." 1- We therefore find .no
warrant for inferring that the present employees have. directly or
indirectly iirdicated their willingness to be subjected to a compulsory
union-security provision without the safeguard of an election under
Section 9 (e) (1) of the Act.
Because the unit covered by the present petition is one as to which
we would have directed a representation election to determine, as the
employees have done in the consent election, whether the employees
involved should be added to the then existing unit, and because the
other employees within the now existing unit have already duly au-
thorized the application of the union-security provision to them, we
believe that the unit herein is appropriate for a union security election-.2
Accordingly, we find that the unit appropriate for the purpose of
an election under Section 9 (e) (1) of the Act consists of all meat
department employees of the Kroger Co. in the stores of the Indian-
apolis , Indiana, Branch, listed below,3 excluding all other employees,
and all guards, professional employees, and supervisors as defined
in the Act. -
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication in this
Tolume.]
1 The clause was executed pursuant to the authorization obtained in Case No.
'35-UA-667 relating to stores in Marion County and became applicable to other outlying
stores within the Indianapolis Branch, with the exception of those involved herein, as
the result of a consent election in Case No. 35-UA-911.
2 See The Manufacturers' Protective Development Assn. ( Consolidated Iron-Steel Manu-
;facturing Company, Taylor and Boggis Division ), 95 NLRB 1059. We recognize that
,this unit-though a proper voting group for a "Globe" type election-is not an appro-
priate unit for collective bargaining . Normally it is the Board 's policy to direct union
-security elections in units which are appropriate for collective bargaining , absent special
circumstances which require a departure from this rule. See Avondale Dairy Co.,
'92 NLRB 89. Here the fact that the remaining segments of the unit have already voted
for a union security 'agreement is sufficient, in our opinion , to warrant such a departure.
3 Logansport, Monticello, Lebanon, Attica, Rensselaer , Delphi, Plainfield, Shelbyville,
Bloomington, Spencer, Mooresville, Franklin, Edinburg, Greenwood, Danville, Columbus,
Martinsville, Greenfield, Liberty, Rushville, Cambridge City, Richmond , Knightstown,.
Hagerstown, Batesville , Greensburg , New Castle Alexandria , Dunkirk, Union City , Tipton,
IFortville, Anderson , and Winchester , 'Indiana.