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December 14, 2016
By Steven Wishnia and Neal Tepel
Seattle, WA – United Food and Commercial Workers President Mark Perrone Dec. 6 denounced Amazon.com’s launch of a prototype grocery store that doesn’t have cashiers. “Amazon is masking its blind greed as progress,” he said in a statement.
“Amazon believes that America’s hardworking men and women are irrelevant to customers—they couldn’t be more wrong.” Amazon had opened a pilot store called Amazon Go to employees on its downtown campus the day before. In it, customers sign in with a mobile app, technology detects which products they pick off the shelves or put back, and the bill is charged to their Amazon account. The company plans to open it to the public next year. “Getting rid of checkout lines is great for customers, and our associates are great for customers, too,” Amazon said in a statement. “This is not about improving customer experience: it’s about destroying good jobs, with no regard to the families and communities impacted,” Perrone responded. Read more
