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Aldi Expansion – Celebration or Concern?

05/12/08

The recent announcement by German supermarket giant Aldi that it would be opening 35 new stores in Ireland over the next 3 years has been greeted with jubilation by the Dublin government and the establishment media. This multi-million investment will create over 600 new jobs and so in the context of an economic downturn this is being lauded as a triumph. The only noted objection has been come from Aldi’s corporate rivals.

However, those of us who are concerned about the undemocratic nature of multi-nationals and how this impacts upon workers rights throughout the world should not be celebrating this expansion.

The Aldi chain of retail outlets began in Germany in 1960 and since then has expanded to 13 other European countries, North America and Australia and currently has 6,500 stores worldwide. The company was started and is still owned by Karl and Theo Albrecht. Karl Albrecht has amassed a grotesque €17 billion (£14.5 Billion), making him one of the world’s richest people.

This massive financial empire has been constructed by its owners on the basis of cutting corners to maximise profit. Staffing is always kept to a minimum with typically only a few employees working at any given time. Crucially, however, the corporate giant has an anti-union policy that essentially forbids its employees from joining trade unions, appointing shop stewards or organising themselves in any way. This practice is often found in the United States with retail companies like Wal-Mart and K-Mart attempting to roll back decades of gains made by working people.

Verdi, a trade union that represents retail workers in Germany, has battled with Aldi for many years in this area and accuses them of intimidating employees who attempt to join unions and of disrupting attempts to elect workers’ representatives within stores. The extent to which Aldi is willing to undermine the basic rights of workers is truly staggering at times.

In Germany employees often endure unwarranted searches of their bags and lockers and so-called “house visits” are carried out by management after an employee has called in sick or has become involved with union activity. Disgracefully there have even been cases reported where menstruating female staff members have been forced to wear different coloured hair bands so that management could ‘allow’ them more toilet breaks.

In the summer of 2000 Aldi management in Dublin sacked six young workers. Their “crime” was joining the retail workers’ union Mandate. Twelve weeks of pickets, protests, boycotts and “dirty shopping” (filling shopping trolleys and leaving them at checkouts without paying for the items) followed. The strike eventually ended just before a planned anti-Aldi European day of action. Aldi agreed to end its victimisation of union members, recognise trade unions and acknowledge their dismissal of the young workers was unfair.

Despite such limited victories Aldi, and indeed the vast majority of multi-national corporations, remain a constant threat to the rights of workers and people in general. Whether it is in sweat-shops in South East Asia or on the shop floor in Ireland they will always attempt to increase their profit margins regardless of whose rights are trampled upon in the process.

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