The good news is on Wednesday, November 3rd Kellogg Company submitted a new offer that they termed their “Last Best Final Offer” to the union.  They also stated that this offer will expire at 11:59 p.m. Nov. 11.

The bad news is the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers union leaders rejected that offer and will not allow it to go to their members for a vote.

In a negotiation update statement from Kellogg’s they wrote:

“Our negotiations have concluded for the day. This afternoon, the company presented a revised offer to the Union.

We are no longer proposing a permanent two-tiered structure. We have offered to continue the current pathway to Legacy wages and benefits, but with significant wage increases for current and future Transitional employees. We’ve proposed maintaining COLA (Cost of Living Adjustment) for Legacy employees. We’ve proposed no changes to current healthcare plans, and in fact, have proposed enhanced benefits for all employees.

The union continues to insist on proposals that are unsustainable and unrealistic. They’ve proposed adding costs that would threaten the future success of our plants and cereal business.

Our proposals include:

  • Continuation of current pathway to Legacy wages and benefits for Transitional employees
  • Wage increases for all, including:
    • 3% upon ratification for Legacy employees, and COLA in the following three years
    • $2-$5/hour increases for Transitional employees depending on years of service
  • Enhanced benefits for all employees
  • Increased pension multiplier for Legacy employees

We’ve consistently addressed what the union has said are their primary concerns.

This is our “Last Best Final Offer” to the union. We asked the union to allow our employees to vote the offer. The union immediately rejected the offer and told us they would not put it before employees for a vote.

The Company remains ready and willing to consider any realistic offers from the union.

Our proposal reflects the contributions of our employees while helping us meet the challenges of the changing cereal business. This offer expires at 11:59 PM, November 11, 2021.”

The union released their own negotiation update on 11-03-2021 with the following statement:

“Brothers and Sisters,

We met for the last time today. We again agreed to negotiate later than our usual end time in hopes we could get something we can recommend. Negotiations ended at 5:19 pm after the company gave us their last best and final offer. That offer did not achieve what we were asking, a pathway to fully vetted workers without takeaways. The company said they would get off their 2-tier and get to a pathway, but they could not find a fully benefitted way to achieve this. With this issue, we were unable to address the other items that are still on the table. We cannot recommend this offer and will not bring it back for the membership to vote on. We agreed that we will not have concessions and that is all their last offer was.

We will be home tomorrow. We will continue this fight for as long as it takes!

Continue to hold the line and stand strong.

-The Negotiation Committee”

So there you have both sides of the story.  I hope both sides can come to some agreement and the union members will be able to go back to work and have a great holiday season.

According to reporting by Bloomberg news Kellogg Company is shipping their cereal from plants outside of the United States to supply their customers in the United States.  Chief Executive Officer Steve Cahillane said in an interview:

“We have plants in Mexico, Canada, the U.K. — Manchester is a very big cereal plant — and even as far away as Australia…So we’ll leverage the totality of our global network.”

Good luck to both sides.

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