Several dozen stores of one of Belgium’s leading supermarket chains have been closed for nearly a month as workers at Delhaize protest the company’s plans to franchise all its outlets, and there’s no sign of a quick end.
(Bloomberg) — Several dozen stores of one of Belgium’s leading supermarket chains have been closed for nearly a month as workers at Delhaize protest the company’s plans to franchise all its outlets, and there’s no sign of a quick end.
Dutch retailer Ahold Delhaize announced in early March that it will transform all 128 of its integrated Delhaize supermarkets into independently operated stores to “strengthen its position in the competitive Belgian retail market.”
Almost one month later — and after three rounds of discussions between Belgian trade unions and the company — some 44 stores remain closed as of Wednesday.
Speaking through a metal gate in front of a Delhaize shop in a bustling neighborhood in Brussels on Tuesday, a striking employee, who declined to give her name for fear of retaliation, said that they’re prepared to keep striking for another month or even longer despite losing daily pay while off work.
The store’s windows were filled with posts updating on the strike and a list of what the workers say they stand to suffer if they’re put under a franchise — including a 25% loss in take-home pay, loss of seniority, meal vouchers and travel expenses, and higher pay for evening work.
Belgium has largely been spared the kind of long-term strikes seen in France and the UK, in large part because most salaries are shielded from inflation by an automatic wage indexation.
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With many Belgian workers receiving a nearly 12% salary boost, the Federation of Enterprises in Belgium has appealed to the federal government to adjust the indexation, saying companies won’t be able to compete in an export-oriented economy, but the measure seems here to stay.
“It gives us social peace,” Belgium’s Finance Minister Vincent Van Peteghem said in a recent interview with Bloomberg. “If you look at what is happening in other countries, you also see there is much more social unrest than in our country. I think that balance is the one we need to maintain.”
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Even so, the supermarket strike is attracting broader union support.
The Confederation of Christian Trade Unions, the largest in Belgium, will organize an action on April 12 in the Netherlands to coincide with Delhaize’s annual shareholder meeting, while labor groups are planning a broader strike in Brussels on April 17.
For its part, Delhaize is pressing ahead, reopening more stores and trying to persuade people to return to work, according to spokesperson Roel Dekelver, who added that franchising is ”the only valid option to guarantee a future for Delhaize in Belgium.” With the planned change, all Delhaize stores would be brought under one model, joining 636 independent affiliated stores under the AD Delhaize, Proxy Delhaize and Shop & Go brand brands.
Dekelver said that more than 80 of its wholly owned stores are now open, and that Belgian law assures workers will be able to keep their original salary and working conditions even when the ownership changes. He said that out of 13,000 employees in Belgium, only a “limited number” are on strike and the “majority are willing to work.”
“They won’t lose their jobs,” he said by phone. “The working conditions are respected by the new store owner of the transition. That’s a guarantee we give and a guarantee that’s also given by the law.”
Belgium’s labor ministry has appointed a mediator for conducting talks between the trade unions and Delhaize. It declined to provide comment on the further course of negotiations.
Dekelver would not elaborate on how much the company is losing on strikes, saying only that “there’s a huge impact on the company and on the future of the company. It costs a lot of money.”
In the meantime, disgruntled shoppers pass by a shuttered store in the Flagey neighborhood as they look for further, sometimes more expensive, alternatives.
“I support the workers and those punished are also the clients,” said Elisabeth Neves-Olivera, who had been shopping at the now-closed Delhaize for 30 years. “I now have to take a bus to make my shopping and people of a certain age, I don’t know how they do it. This is the first time it is happening.”
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