Anheuser-Busch, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Dec 22, 1953

107 N.L.R.B. 496 (N.L.R.B. 1953)

496 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
production requirements. The production progress clerk spends
the major part of his time on the production floor and is de-
scribed as "the eyes of the general foreman." The material
control clerk keeps accurate records of materials received
into the plant. He is responsible to the production control
supervisor and works in the same general plant area. The
chief stores and receiving clerk acts as a leadman for other
employees. In this capacity, he directs the employees who issue
materials required for the manufacture of Employer's products.
It is also his responsibility to see that adequate inventory con-
trol is maintained . He reports to the general foreman.
In view of the foregoing, it is apparent that the production
control assistant , production progress clerk , material control
clerk, and the chief stores and receiving clerk perform func-
tions generally performed by plant clerical employees whom
the Board customarily includes in production and maintenance
units. 5 Accordingly, we shall include them in the unit.
Purchasing assistant; expediter--purchasing; clerk--order
department: The record does not contain adequate evidence to
enable us to determine whether these employees are primarily
office clerical, plant clerical, or managerial employees. Under
these circumstances, we will permit them to vote subject to
challenge.
We find that the following employees of the Employer con-
stitute a unit appropriate for the purposes of collective bar-
gaining within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act: All pro-
duction, maintenance, and repair employees at the Employer's
Norwalk, California, plant, including electricians, working
leadmen; plant clerical employees; layout and fitup--A, B, C;
machinist; boxer and crater; welder; steel straightener;
electrician - -maintenance ; general maintenance ; drill press and
machine operator "A"; painter--spray and hand; crane oper-
ator; storekeeper; shipping and receiving clerk; production
progress clerk ; chief stores and receiving clerk ; assembler
and experienced helper; helper; janitor; production control
assistant ; and the material control clerk, but excluding office
clerical employees, professional employees, guards, and
supervisors as defined in the Act'.
[Text of Direction of Election omitted from publication.]
5 Cf. Clarostat Mfg. Co , Inc., 105 NLRB 20; East Texas Steel Castings Company, 95 NLRB
1135; Gluck Bros., Inc., 83 NLRB 683; General Electric Company, 81 NLRB 654; Orleans
Materials & Equipment Co., Inc., 76 NLRB 351.
6 The record does not indicate that the production control assistant or the chief stores and
receiving clerk possess any supervisory authority.
ANHEUSER-BUSCH, INC., FALSTAFF BREWING CORPORA-
TION, GRIESEDIECK BROTHERS BREWERY COMPANY,
GRIESEDIECK -WESTERN BREWERY COMPANY (HYDE
PARK PLANT), and INTERNATIONAL UNION OF UNITED
BREWERY, FLOUR, CEREAL, SOFT DRINK AND DIS-
107 NLRB No. 113.
ANHEUSER-BUSH, INC 497
TILLERY WORKERS OF AMERICA, C. I. 0., AND ITS
LOCAL UNION NO. 187, Petitioner
ANHEUSER-BUSCH, INC. and INTERNATIONAL UNION OF
UNITED BREWERY FLOUR, CEREAL, SOFT-DRINK AND
DISTILLERY WORKERS OF AMERICA, C. I. 0., AND ITS
BREWERY ENGINEERS, LOCAL 246, Petitioner
ANHEUSER-BUSCH, INC. and INTERNATIONAL UNION OF
UNITED BREWERY, FLOUR, CEREAL SOFT DRINK AND
DISTILLERY WORKERS OF AMERICA, C. I. 0., AND ITS
LOCAL UNION NO. 187, Petitioner
ANHEUSER-BUSCH, INC., FALSTAFF BREWING CORPORA-
TION, GRIESEDIECK BROTHERS BREWERY COMPANY,
GRIESEDIECK - WESTERN BREWERY COMPANY (HYDE
PARK PLANT) and BREWERY FIREMEN, OILERS AND
MAINTENANCE MEN, LOCAL UNION NO. 367, affiliated with
INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,
CHAUFFEURS, WAREHOUSEMEN AND HELPERS OF
AMERICA, A. F. L., Petitioner
ANHEUSER -BUSCH, INC. and BREWING, MALTING AND GEN-
ERAL LABOR DEPARTMENT, LOCAL NO. 6, affiliated with
INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,
CHAUFFEURS , WAREHOUSEMEN AND HELPERS OF
AMERICA, A. F. L., Petitioner
ANHEUSER-BUSCH, INC., FALSTAFF BREWING CORPORA-
TION, GRIESEDIECK BROTHERS BREWERY COMPANY,
GRIESEDIECK - WESTERN BREWERY COMPANY (HYDE
PARK PLANT) and BREWING, MALTING AND GENERAL
LABOR DEPARTMENTS, LOCAL UNION NO. 6, affiliated
with INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD OF TEAMSTERS,
CHAUFFEURS, WAREHOUSEMEN AND HELPERS OF
AMERICA, A . F. L., Petitioner . Cases Nos. 14 -RC-1952,
14-RC-1955 , 14-RC - 1988, 14-RC -2034 , 14-RC-2035 , and 14-
RC-2036. December 22, 1953
SUPPLEMENTAL DECISION
On March 27 , 1953, the Board issued a Decision , Order, and
Direction of Elections' in the above - entitled cases , establish-
ing, inter ali a, a multiemployer unit of bottle - shop employees
at the St. Louis , Missouri , breweries of the several Employers
herein, including Anheuser . On June 24 , 1953, following a secret
election conducted among employees on the bottle - shop unit,
the Board certified Brewery Workers , C.I.O., and its Local
1103 NLRB 1205.
498 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
187,2 as the exclusive bargaining representative of all employees
in this unit.
On July 10 , 1953 , Anheuser filed a motion to clarify the
bottle-shop unit, so far as it pertained to its employees, to
determine specifically whether a group of 5 employees who
regularly work in the basement of the Bevo building at Anheuser,
but are assigned from time to time to similar work on the first
floor of the Bevo building , are included in, or excluded from,
the bottle - shop unit during such assignments . On July 10, 1953,
the Board remanded the cases to the Regional Director for
further hearing on this issue.
Pursuant to notice , further hearing was held before Harry
G. Carlson , hearing officer . The hearing officer's rulings made
at the hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby
affirmed.
Upon the entire record in these cases , including the record
made at the further hearing , the Board makes the following
supplemental findings of fact:
That portion of the multiemployer bottle-shop unit which
applies to Anheuser employees and to the issue now before the
Board reads as follows:
All hourly rated production and maintenance employees
engaged in production, shipping , storage, receiving, and
noncraft maintenance operations in bottling departments
and bottling department areas , including . . . employees in
the basement and on the first and second floors of . . . the
Bevo building at Anheuser -Busch , Inc.; but excluding . . .
employees in the draught beer washing and packaging oper-
ations in the Bevo building at Anheuser -Busch , Inc.,; and
in government cellars; brewing department employees;
. . . employees in areas other than bottling department
areas; . . ." ( Emphasis supplied.)
Brewery Workers , C.I.O., and its Local 187, alleges that the
Bevo basement employees assigned from time to time to work
on the first floor of the Bevo building are essentially Bevo
basement employees and are therefore properly included in the
certified bottle - shop unit , previously found appropriate by the
Board. Local 6 of the Teamsters , AFL, 3 however, contends
that these employees , so and as assigned, become , by virtue
of this assignment to brewing department areas , brewing de-
partment employees and that they are, as such , excluded from
representation in the bottle - shop unit . The Employer, urging
the operating economy of assigning material handlers where
they are needed , takes no specific position respecting the
representation dispute.
2 International Union of United Brewery, Flour , Cereal, Soft Drink and Distillery Workers
of America , C I. 0., and its Local Union No. 187.
3Brewing , Malting and General Labor Departments, Local Union No. 6 , affiliated with
International Brotherhood of Teamsters , Chauffeurs , Warehousemen and Helpers of America,
AFL.
ANHEUSER-BUSH, INC. 499
The bottling operations occupy the upper 5 floors and the
brewing department operations occupy the first and third floors
of the 7-story Bevo building. The basement in that building is
used primarily as freight yard, with all incoming shipments
arriving by rail handled there. Shipments arrivingbytruck are
handled on the first floor. Shipments of empty cooperage, re-
gardless of how they arrive, are lifted by means of elevators
to the brewing department area on the third floor for washing
and later lowered to the first floor brewing department for
racking and filling. The handling of such empty cooperage on
the first floor gives rise to the current dispute.
Although normally a brewing department employee unloads
empty cooperage in the "kick-off" area4 on the first floor,
when the accumulation of such empty cooperage becomes ex-
cessive a group of 5 basement employees is assigned to that
area to move it to the elevators . These are usually the same 5
employees . At the further hearing , it appeared that during 1
year these employees received 168 such group assignments,
involving about 3,000 man-hours. Each, nevertheless, spends
the major portion of his time doing similar freight work in the
basement , where he is regularly stationed , and the work he
performs on the first floor is indistinguishable from the work
of moving empty cooperage in the basement.5
Under these circumstances, we conclude that in view of the
major work interest in common between the Bevo basement
freight-handling employees who are from time to time assigned
to first floor work and the other Bevo basement freight-handling
employees who are not so assigned , and the similar work per-
formed in the two locations, all such freight -handling employees
are properly in the bottle-shop unit, for which International
Union of United Brewery, Flour, Cereal, Soft Drink and Dis-
tillery Workers of America, CIO, and its Local 187, was certi-
fied as exclusive bargaining representative.6
4The "kick-off " area is a temporary storage area adjacent to the first floor brewing oper-
ations, within the brewery area enclosure prescribed by tax regulations
5 In accordance with settlement of earlier jurisdictional disputes, freight-handling employees
from the Bevo basement assigned for first floor empty-cooperage handling were given brewing
department job classifications while they were performing this work and received 81/2 to
131/2 cents more per hour than when they were doing the same type of work in the Bevo
basement. This differential was accorded to them by the Employer at a time when Local 6 of
the Teamsters, AFL, claimed jurisdiction over them as part of its brewing department unit
As noted in the original decision, the Board declined to base its unit determination in the
instant case upon factors which would "continue indefinitely the very jurisdiction disputes the
parties so earnestly sought to avoid."
6Cf. The Curtis Bay Towing Company, 105 NLRB 524, and cases cited therein.