60,000 members of the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 770 in Southern California will vote next Wednesday on whether to strike at three grocery chains. The contracts between the workers and stores expired six weeks ago. Spokesman for two of the chains said that a strike vote was unnecessary, and that negotiations were making progress. A previous strike and lockout in 2003 lasted for 4 months and cost the stores an estimated $2 billion.
See "SoCal grocery union seeks strike authorization", Business Week, April 14, 2011