Word: farah
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AFTER 21 MONTHS of bitter denunciation and unbridled hostility on both sides, the Farah Manufacturing Company has finally recognized the rights of its 9000 workers to join one of the country's oldest labor unions, the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America. Company president Willie Farah once said that he would rather "go bankrupt than unionize." But faced with a National Labor Relations Board judge's condemnation, a growing group of angry stockholders and a determined union willing to continue the boycott indefinitely, Farah had few alternatives to choose from...
...strikers, a minority of the 9,000 Farah employees who were scattered in nine plants in the Southwest, were easily replaced by the company from the large pool of poor, nonunion Mexican American workers in the region. In his decision, however. Judge Maloney ordered Farah to reinstate the strikers, along with the six employees whose dismissal for union activities had triggered the strike. The company, he ruled, must grant the union access to its plants to organize the workers. Finally, Farah was told to pay not only the union's legal costs but also those of the NLRB...
Though the judge's outspoken decision is technically only a recommendation, the full NLRB is expected to approve soon, as it has in previous such cases. Company President Willie Farah, 53, then plans to appeal in the courts. Farah, son of a Lebanese dry-goods merchant, had propelled his father's business to record sales of $164 million in 1971 (profits: $6 million) mainly by cutting labor costs through using modern machinery. Last December, in testimony to his hard-driving methods and stubborn resistance to union demands, he was named "Man of the Year" by the trade magazine...
...appears unmoved by the financial toll that the strike is taking of his company. A nationwide boycott of Farah products, backed by the AFL-CIO and strongly endorsed by the bishop of El Paso, the Most Rev. Sidney M. Metzger, has bitten deeply into sales, despite a high-priced TV advertising campaign featuring athletes wearing Farah pants...
...sales were $132 million, down 15% from the year before, and profits were $43,000; company officials concede that the boycott has forced Farah products off retail shelves in many cities. The price of the company's stock has plummeted to $5 per share, down from $30 before the strike. Four plants have been closed, but the five El Paso plants are operating with a reduced work force. Worse, Farah is losing the support that he once had from the business community in El Paso, which is hurting from the company's decline. Local newspapers played the NLRB...