Workers at the first unionized Apple Store in the country ratified a labor contract with the tech giant on Tuesday, after a year and a half in which bargaining appeared to stall for long stretches and union campaigns at other stores fell short.
The union affirmed the outcome. Apple said that it did not dispute the result and that it was pleased to have an agreement.
The contract, covering about 85 workers at a Towson, Md., store who voted to join the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers in June 2022, will provide a typical worker with a raise of roughly 10 percent over the next three years.
The workers will also effectively receive the same benefits as those in nonunion stores — a point of contention since the company introduced new benefits that excluded union stores in the fall of 2022 — as well as guaranteed severance pay.
“We are giving our members a voice in their futures and a strong first step toward further gains,” the store’s bargaining committee said in a statement after reaching a deal with the company. “Together, we can build on this success in store after store.”
The contract talks had appeared to bog down over equal access to the benefits that other stores receive, and over a nationwide change in Apple’s scheduling and availability policy for part-time workers. The union said the policy change would have forced roughly half a dozen Towson workers to quit because of conflicts with other commitments.
Workers at the store said they had considered striking if the company had not budged on these priorities; they voted in May to authorize a strike.
But the two sides settled both issues late last month. Union workers will receive the recently introduced benefits and any subsequent changes to existing benefits. They will bargain over any new benefit when it is introduced.
The company agreed to allow the store’s current part-time workers to remain largely under the old availability policy if they choose to. The union agreed to drop a handful of proposals, including a more generous overtime rule and bereavement leave.
“I’m so proud of our bargaining committee and our store team for sticking through this long journey,” said Chaya Barrett, a committee member and a longtime worker at the store. “It’s been a challenging, scary and frustrating road.”
An Apple spokeswoman said the agreement “allows Towson team members to enjoy similar performance-based wage increases this year as last year, along with the same benefits our U.S. retail employees currently receive.”
The contract will provide an average worker with a 4 percent wage increase this year, followed by 3 percent increases in two subsequent years. Apple typically reviews wages for nonunion workers annually. The company’s policy is to provide severance pay to workers laid off for business reasons, but the union contract guarantees that the severance pay won’t change.
After the successful union election in Towson, workers at an Apple Store in Oklahoma City voted to join the Communications Workers of America in October 2022. But campaigns at other Apple Stores fizzled out in the following months, and the communications workers lost a unionization vote this year at a store in Short Hills, N.J.
The Towson union argued that the contract proposal undermined a core claim that Apple, like many employers, had made to workers ahead of union elections: that they could lose benefits if they unionized.
“This took away their narrative,” said Jay Wadleigh, a business agent with the machinists’ union who advised the workers during the negotiation. “They tell stores: ‘You could lose everything. You’d have to start at ground zero.’ We have a contract saying that’s not what happened.”
Experts said that as a result, the contract could assist future organizing campaigns at other stores.
“I think it will help somewhat,” said John Logan, a professor at San Francisco State University who is an expert on how companies respond to union campaigns. Fear of losing one’s job or losing pay or benefits tends to be the biggest obstacle to union organizing, he added, so “anything that lessens the fear of joining a union is likely to benefit organizing at other stores.”
In the short term, the Oklahoma City store, which has been bargaining separately with Apple since last year, is seeking to reach a contract along similar lines in the coming months.
Michael Forsythe, a worker on the Oklahoma City bargaining committee, said the Towson contract had generated considerable interest among his colleagues. “We definitely want to use it as momentum,” he said. Workers there plan a strike authorization vote this month.
Workers at other Apple Stores have begun to express interest in unionizing since the tentative agreement in Towson, according to Kevin Gallagher, a longtime employee there who recently began working for the machinists’ union.
Mr. Gallagher said he had recently spoken with a worker at a store in the Southeast who had inquired about organizing after hearing news of the contract agreement.