Good Vibrations joins the ranks of a growing number of Bay Area working cohorts opting to unionize, and the staff at the Oakland Museum of California has officially announced unionization plans
Unionization — the act of establishing a trade union amongst a group of like-employed workers — continues to increase across the United States, year after year. In 2022, more than 200,000 workers in the United States became union members; amid demoralizing earning gaps between corporate executives and middle-class earners, stagnant salaries and hourly earnings creating more of a housing burden, and predatory firing tactics on the rise (as well as union busting), the peace of mind and protections afforded by workers’ guilds have great appeal. Mind you, unions appeal to the middle-class to low-income earners; they’re points of loathing for CEOs, overtly well-off business owners, and the like… because they thwart the latter group’s ability to prey on those who make pennies to their Benjamins.
Recently, the Oakland Museum of California and Good Vibes, the California sex shop chain formerly known as Good Vibrations, voted to form trade unions. As reported by Mission Local, Good Vibes’s forthcoming Good Vibes Union won handsomely by a 24-2 vote, the flagship store on Valencia Street joining the other seven Northern California locations when the approved union was enacted.
“We need a union here, so our staff can win for ourselves the kind of empowered, pleasurable lives that we encourage for our customers,” said Sam Pollack, a worker at the Palo Alto store — who was one of the leading forces in the union drive — to Mission Local.
Good Vibes Union will be affiliated with the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union Local 5; unsurprisingly Joel Kaminsky, who’s owned the historically women-owned business since 2006, was opposed to the unionization when it was suggested in an earlier letter procured by the media outlet — “[Good Vibes] certainly [understands] that unions are necessary [for] many companies and industries, we just don’t feel you need one here,” Kaminsky wrote.
In a like-minded stance for workers’ protections, the Oakland Museum of California announced its staff was intending to unionize last week.
“We are asking management to join with us in bringing our institution into alignment with our stated values of equity, community, and humanity,” reads the union’s statement. The union, which has not yet been made official, would represent the 90 staff at the Oakland culture touchstone — a decision made to largely protect them amid a wave of tumultuous events in the nonprofit world. (Other museums in the country, like Whitney Museum and the Guggenheim in New York and the Art Institute of Chicago, have unionized in recent years as a result of concerns spurred by pandemic-era layoffs, a lack of funding in the arts sector, and the general unsteadiness that comes with putting career roots down in the nonprofit realm.)
According to KQED, OMCA management is currently reviewing the union organizers’ requests. If approved, OMCA would join the nationwide union American Federation of State, Council, and Municipal Employees (AFSCM) which represents 1.4 million workers.
These two unionizaions follow the staff at SF’s world-famous independent bookstore and publishing house City Lights recognizing that its 16 or so eligible employees can join the Industrial Workers of the World Local 660 — a labor organization started 1905, which represents nearly 9,000 workers across North America.
