Sodexo: unions pressure the mass catering company to negotiate a global agreement

Aborted talks. Initially planned for June 30^th, the opening of talks was postponed, because the French company refused to negotiate “under pressure” from a globalized union movement. Sodexo also invoked the lasting tensions between the SEIU and Sodexo’s American management. For months, the latter has been engaged in a trial of strength with this union which multiplies spectacular action. The company employs 380,000 people in nearly 80 countries, almost one third of them in northern America where it is a key market player. Since the beginning of this local conflict, the group’s management denies refusing the right to assemble and says that the SEIU is carrying out a denigration campaign, trying to enter the sector to the detriment of the historical union, Unite Here. The company refusing to acknowledge the union was the straw that broke the camel’s back and led some unions where Sodexo is present to request better working conditions.