CALIF. SUPERMARKETS Workers picket at 3 store chains

Two grocers locked out workers in support of other grocers facing a strike.
LOS ANGELES TIMES
LOS ANGELES -- Shoppers in Southern California arrived at their local supermarkets Sunday to buy groceries, only to find turmoil, as thousands of union workers picketed the region's three largest chains.
The first supermarket strike in Southern California in 25 years started late Saturday night as members of the United Food and Commercial Workers walked off the job at Safeway Inc.'s Vons and Pavilions stores.
By early Sunday, employees at Kroger Co.'s Ralphs and Albertsons Inc.'s outlets, which share the same union contract, had joined the fray after being locked out of their stores in a show of solidarity by the companies.
In all, 859 stores and 70,000 workers in both Southern California and parts of Central California are affected by the strike and lockouts. The UFCW estimated that as many as 10,000 workers, from as far north as San Luis Obispo and as far south as the Mexican border, walked the picket lines at any one time Sunday.
"Support our picket lines! Don't shop at this store!" sign-wielding clerks yelled out to customers pulling into the parking lot of a Vons in Los Angeles' Highland Park district.
Trying to manage
Picketing workers turned many customers away, leaving aisles mostly deserted. Those who crossed the picket lines to shop found a handful of clerks fumbling with the store's cash registers.
"It's very bad in there," said Sondra Alcantara, as she lifted her bags into the back of her SUV at the Highland Park Vons. "The guy didn't know what he was doing," she said, adding that the clerk tried to give her change twice.
Workers walking the picket lines at stores around Southern California said they were disappointed that things had come down to a strike, but they insisted they were prepared to hold out for as long as it takes to preserve their health-care and pension benefits, which the companies are intent on rolling back.
"I get paid 80 cents above minimum wage," said Gina Guiglielmotto, a floral clerk overseeing locked-out workers at a Pasadena Ralphs. "People just don't realize what we're fighting for. They think we're ungrateful. But we want to stop the constant degression of wages."
The supermarkets are proposing a wage freeze and cuts to health and pension benefits for current employees, as well as a substantially lower wage and benefit package for new hires. They say they must win concessions in order to compete with a host of new rivals, including discount giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which is a nonunion operation.
UFCW negotiators are seeking hourly wage increases of 50 cents the first year and 45 cents each of the following two years. Veteran clerks and stockers earn as much as $17.90 an hour. Meat-cutters, the highest paid employees in the store, earn up to $19.18 per hour, while baggers earn up to $7.40 per hour.