Sotheby's locks out unionized art handlers, sparks picket line

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/02/us-sothebys-lockout-idUSTRE7715NH20110802

By Ray Sanchez

NEW YORK | Tue Aug 2, 2011 3:26pm EDT

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Unionized art handlers and fellow Teamsters picketed outside Sotheby's on Tuesday after the auction house locked the workers out last week following a drawn-out contract dispute.

The 43 art handlers, members of Teamsters Local 814 whose contract expired in early July, were told by the auction house on Friday they could not return to their jobs at Sotheby's Manhattan headquarters and had been replaced by temporary workers.

The lockout took hold a month before the start of the critical fall sales, which last season took in hundreds of millions of dollars for Sotheby's and rival Christie's.

Sotheby's said in a statement it had been negotiating "in good faith" since May, and had offered "a contract with attractive terms," which the union rejected.

"The lockout of our property handlers is an outcome that none of us welcome," Sotheby's spokeswoman Lauren Gioia said. "We will continue to bargain in good faith in the hopes that a new agreement can be reached as soon as possible."

Talks were set to resume next week.

FULL story at link.

[patrice]

1. I bet that's pretty specialized work, art handling. Can you imagine the managers looking for scabs?

With all of those nervous collectors looking over their shoulders?

I wonder if those workers are bonded too, so scabs would have to have more expensive bonds?

[glinda]

2. Guess you just showed who would benefit financially from this.

[patrice]

3. Yeah, could be, but that doesn't necessarily mean its intentional.

Motive depends upon rather fine levels of detail in whatever is on the table.