Teamsters Mounting Campaign to Organize Drivers at XPO Logistics

By Robbie Whelan 

The International Brotherhood of Teamsters is mounting a campaign to organize truckers driving for XPO Logistics Inc., opening a new front in the union's push to revive its influence in the trucking industry.

Last week, the Teamsters announced that drivers for XPO Logistics Inc. in Aurora, Ill. and workers at XPO's warehouse in North Haven, Conn. had filed petitions with the National Labor Relations Board to seek union representation. The drives follow similar, recent moves by the Teamsters to organize XPO employees in Laredo, Tex. and Vernon, Calif.

The Teamsters have made some inroads organizing truck drivers across the country, including an aggressive campaign to unionize drivers for FedEx Corp.'s freight division. In March, a federal judge ordered FedEx to bargain with the Teamsters at two locals, in Philadelphia and Charlotte, after FedEx sought to overturn rulings by the NLRB. Teamsters locals have also backed efforts to unionize drivers at ports in California.

Unionized drivers dominated trucking for much of the 20th century, but membership fell off sharply starting in the 1980s, when deregulation made it easier for new, nonunion fleets to enter the market.

The Teamsters' efforts have focused on the less-than-truckload segment of the industry, in which drivers haul freight from multiple shippers in each load. They tend to drive shorter distances, making them easier to organize than drivers working cross-country routes. FedEx is the largest "LTL" carrier in the U.S.

Most of the XPO employees the Teamsters are trying to organize formerly worked for Con-way Inc., the second-largest LTL carrier, which XPO bought for $3 billion in September 2015. YRC Inc., the third-largest LTL carrier, has a unionized workforce.

"The Teamsters have been mildly successful...on a localized level," said Jason Seidl, an analyst with Cowen & Co. "You can't organize a driver if they're not around. Truckload drivers are never in one place, whereas LTL drivers are typically home every night. So the unions organize by going from terminal to terminal."

Tyson Johnson, director of the Teamsters freight division, said that first Con-way, and later XPO, had failed to deliver on promised wage increases and made cuts to driver benefits over the last two years. Union officials say organizing hundreds of XPO workers will make it harder for the company to lay off employee drivers and replace them with owner-operators who work as contractors. The union also has organizing efforts planned for the coming weeks in Baltimore, Cartersville, Ga. and Miami.

"The race is on," Mr. Johnson said. "We intend to organize XPO and Con-way bumper to bumper."

In a written statement, an XPO spokeswoman said the company had respected promises made to former Con-way employees.

"XPO has no plans to lay off LTL line-haul drivers and replace them with owner-operators," the company said.

Unionized drivers typically receive better benefits and more favorable rules about how much they are required to drive, Mr. Seidl said. Driver compensation is the biggest cost at most trucking companies after fuel, and those extra benefits can eat into already slim margins, analysts say. Mr. Seidl said he expects XPO to spend more this quarter than in previous periods defending against the Teamsters' efforts.

Write to Robbie Whelan at [e-mail]

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 21, 2016 11:29 ET (15:29 GMT)

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