Apple reaches agreement with unionized Maryland Apple Store workers

Some 85 employees of the first unionized Apple Store in Towson, Maryland will vote on the first union-negotiated agreement with Apple to improve working conditions on August 6th, 2024.

The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers' Coalition of Organized Retail Employees (IAM-CORE) negotiated the tentative agreement between the retail workers and Apple.

The new agreement, which would be good for three years, includes better work-life balance on scheduling and pay raises. Both areas had been a complaint amongst the workers at the Towson Store.

Other improvements include rules on transparency, a severance clause, and limits on contracted employees. All current benefits are preserved, and there is an agreement to bargain over any future additions, the union said in a statement.

"We're extremely proud to be the first union to take on this fight for Apple workers," said IAM Eastern Territory General Vice President David Sullivan. "The true partnership between the IAM, IAM CORE and Apple workers has led us to this historic moment."

The workers at the Towson Apple Store voted to join the union in June of 2022. The 85 workers, the union and Apple began negotiating a formal agreement in May of 2023. After a year of what the union called stalling tactics by the store's management, workers voted to authorize a strike sanction against the company in June 2024.

There are only a handful of Apple retail stores that have unionized staff. The staff at the store in Reston, Virginia documented Apple management's stalling tactics in a secret video taken during negotiations.

The US National Labor Relations Board has twice ruled that Apple has broken the law with regards to labor relations. The NLRB found Apple guilty of denying unionized stores the same benefits it gave non-unionized stores, and also conducted illegal interrogations of union staff at its World Trade Center store in New York City.