Every family has a Thanksgiving tradition. Once the dishes have been cleared and dessert has been eaten, my family always goes to see a movie. Some families get up early on the morning of turkey day, just to watch the Thanksgiving-Day Parade, and see how those massive floats effortlessly fly down the streets of New York City. Then, we have the unique group of people, at least in America, that grab their sleeping bags, tents, protein bars, and outdoor folding seats, and head to the nearest Best Buy (BBY) or Target (TGT) to beat out other consumers ahead of Black Friday.
The term “Black Friday” dates back to 1869, when two Wall Street financier, Jay Gould, and Jim Fisk, tried to drive up the price of gold by purchasing as much gold as they could get their hands on, ultimately sending the market into free-fall and bankrupting every investor in the space. Sometime later, the term has become synonymous with the retail frenzy that ensues on the Friday after Thanksgiving. The nation’s most popular retail stores, from Target (TGT) to Apple (AAPL), all offer some sort of deal on this day, and in recent years, online marketplaces like Amazon (AMZN) have sought to get a piece of the action.
Over the last few years, the Black Friday tradition has permeated the retail culture of the U.K. and parts of Europe, and Amazon (AMZN) reportedly hired thousands of seasonal workers to meet the demands of customers around the world during the upcoming holiday season. According to CNBC, U.K. consumers have already purchased 100,000 toys and 60,000 beauty items, just in the waking hours of Black Friday.
However, many Amazon (AMZN) employees are not enthused nor excited for the biggest shopping day of the year, and even after CEO Jeff Bezos announced the company’s plan to increase its miming wage to $15/hr. To put this wage increase in perspective, two of Amazon’s (AMZN) key competitors, Target and Walmart, reportedly pay their employees a minimum of $11/hr. Well, hundreds from the Amazon (AMZN) beehive decided that they still are suffering from unfair working conditions and plan on organizing walkouts at multiple Amazon locations in support of creating change.
According to Fortune, Amazon (AMZN) worker protests are planned to take place in France, Germany, Poland, and Italy. No matter the location, the motivating idea behind the demonstrations are the same. Amazon (AMZN) employees want everyone to know that they are not robots, and the “inhuman” circumstances under which they work are no longer acceptable.
“People with kids, homes, bills to pay —they’re not robots. Jeff Bezos is the richest bloke [person] on the planet; he can afford to sort this out. You’d think making the workplace safer so people aren’t carted out of the warehouse in an ambulance is in everyone’s interest, but Amazon seemingly have no will to get round the table with us as the union representing hundreds of their staff.”
–Tim Roache, General Secretary, British Trade Union
The demonstrations, according to the beliefs of Amazon employees, will hopefully force users of the company’s website to think about the ramifications of their purchases, outside the scope of simply ordering and receiving products. While Amazon (AMZN) has rolled out drone-delivery as an option for customers in certain parts of the world, warehouse employees are still human and fear that their work is exceedingly becoming dehumanizing. Secretary Roache from the British Trade Union says U.K. Amazon (AMZN) employees are “working people and the communities Amazon operates in deserve better than this. That’s what we’re campaigning for.”
Naturally, Amazon (AMZN) UK responded to today’s protest actions with a statement from one of their many spokespeople:
“All of our sites are safe places to work and reports to the contrary are simply wrong. According to the UK Government’s Health and Safety Executive, Amazon has over 40% fewer injuries on average than other transportation…We encourage everyone to compare our pay, benefits, and working conditions to others and come see for yourself on one of the public tours we offer every day at our centers across the U.K.”
–Amazon U.K. Statement Regarding Black Friday Protests
