NLRB Says Trader Joe’s Closed E. 14th St. Wine Shop To Quash Union Drive

The 2022 closure of Trader Joe’s Wine Shop on E. 14th St. was an alleged act of labor retaliation, according to a complaint issued by the National Labor Relations Board on Jan. 12. They also said that the store should be reopened, with employees made whole for lost wages.

The complaint was initially reported on by the Huffington Post in a Jan. 18 article.

The wine shop, which was located just down the street from Union Square on the northern edge of the East Village, was the only branch of the popular grocer’s wine spin-off in New York State.

Specifically, the NLRB argued that the company’s August 2022 closure of the popular alcohol vender had been carried out to quash union organizing. The United Food and Commercial Workers, a national labor union that was running the organizing drive at the time, filed unfair labor practices claims against Trader Joe’s after the store shuttered.

“These workers showed up every day, delivering the knowledge and service that Trader Joe’s is so famous for, only to wake up and find out that their store had been closed overnight,” the union said. “Trader Joe’s shamelessly and illegally engaged in union busting to scare Trader Joe’s workers across the region and stop these workers from having a voice on the job.”

Trader Joe’s–which has opposed union organizing drives at other Manhattan stores, not to mention nationally–has now taken issue with the very existence of the NLRB.

The National Labor Relations Act, which was enacted during the Great Depression in 1935, provides remedy to workers affected by what it considers to be unfair labor practices.

A lawyer representing the corporation, Christopher Murphy, told a judge at Jan. 20 hearing that he believes “the National Labor Relations Act as interpreted and/or applied in this matter, including but not limited to the structure and organization of the National Labor Relations Board and the agency’s administrative law judges, is unconstitutional.”

Seth Goldstein, a lawyer representing the union Trader Joe’s United, told the Huff Post that he finds this argument “insidious.“ If upheld, he said it would take labor rights “back to 1920.”

Charles Muhl, the administrative judge overseeing the hearing, told Murphy that it would be up to federal courts to address his argument. In a tongue-in-cheek reference to his role with the NLRB, he said that “’I’m certainly not going to be ruling on my own constitutionality anytime soon.”

If a settlement between Trader Joe’s and the NLRB is not arrived at, an administrative judge will rule on the complaint.

Trader Joe’s did not return comment as of press time.