Support Nabisco Jobs in Chicago

Irene Rosenfeld, CEO Mondelēz International, Inc.

In July 2015, Nabisco (Mondelēz) announced it had decided to invest $130 million in a plant in Salinas, Mexico, instead of investing it in its iconic Southside Chicago Nabisco bakery. Mondelēz called on the workers to come up with $46 million in annual savings (in perpetuity) at the Chicago facility for the company, or it would take the $130 million planned investment to its Salinas, Mexico bakery. In order for the union members to generate $46 million in annual savings, they would have to take a wage and benefit cut of $22 to $29 per hour every year.

The company announced it will move nine product lines to the Salinas bakery, which will result in the loss of 600 good paying Chicago jobs. The BCTGM continues to fight the company's decision to export the union jobs.  

Nabisco’s decision to send production to Mexico continues a decades-long pattern of closing plants in the U.S., Canada and other industrialized countries, and shifting that production to low-wage countries. These countries have few, if any, environmental, health and safety, or food safety laws to protect workers, citizens and the environment. 

And while workers are being asked to take massive cuts, the company’s CEO is laughing all the way to the bank:

Mondelēz CEO Irene Rosenfeld took in more than $21 million in total compensation in 2014, a nearly $6 million increase from the previous year as she and her Board of Directors continue to attempt to drive down wages and benefits of their own employees worldwide. Over the past eight years, she alone has received about $170 million in compensation from the corporation.

Join the BCTGM's fight to save American jobs by signing our petition to Mondelēz CEO Irene Rosenfeld asking her to support North America's production workers and keep Nabisco jobs in Chicago! 

To: Irene Rosenfeld, CEO Mondelēz International, Inc.
From: [Your Name]

As people of faith and conscience, who believe in social and community justice, we know that the true sense of community has to have at its core, economic justice for working people. Business, labor, religious leaders, community social organizations and elected officials must provide fertile ground for the creation, and the continuation, of strong, family sustaining employment. Robust communities, grounded in well-paying middle class jobs are the basis for healthy and thriving families, healthy environments, and flourishing neighborhoods free of crime, poverty, and hopelessness. Long-term equitable relationships between business, citizens, working families, and community and faith-based organizations are essential for the success of all communities.

Such success is based on these values and it is with that sense of social unity that we call upon Mondelēz/Nabisco to reassess its decision to send more than 600 jobs from its historic Chicago bakery to a plant in Salinas, Mexico.

Generations of families from this Southside Chicago community have produced Nabisco products for more than five decades and have helped make Mondelēz a $35 billion powerhouse in the global food industry. Not only will Nabisco’s decision to send these jobs from its plant in Chicago to Mexico impact over 600 hard working families in Chicago, it will also impact an estimated 1,200 to 1,800 spin-off jobs within the city.

By outsourcing this production to Mexico, Nabisco will not only destroy the economic balance within the city of Chicago, but it will also exploit Mexican workers who will be paid just dollars-per-hour for the same work that was able to sustain middle class families in Chicago.

Adding insult to injury, the Nabisco products manufactured cheaply in Mexico will be shipped back to the American consumer, including those in Chicago. Mondelēz/Nabisco wants the full participation of Americans in the purchasing of its products, but continues to make repeated moves to increasingly exclude Americans from participating in the production of its products. Such clearly depicts the unfair treatment by Mondelēz/Nabisco of the American worker and the communities in which they and their families live.

As people of faith, conscience and social unity we call upon Mondelēz/Nabisco to reverse its decision to send production to Mexico and keep these middle class jobs in Chicago.
Unless the jobs of Chicago Nabisco workers remain in North America, we the undersigned pledge to:

• Educate American consumers on Mondelēz/Nabisco’s corporate decisions to move U.S. middle class jobs to Mexico;

• Engage in a national dialogue with consumers in the United States and Canada, people of faith, conscience and social unity, to boycott Mondelēz/Nabisco’s products that are made in Mexico;

• Resist Mondelēz/Nabisco’s future attempts both regionally, nationally and globally to destroy good-paying jobs by moving them to low-wage economies with little or no business regulations.