During the boycott hundreds of consumers, including vegan and food justice advocates, labor organizations, and grocery cooperatives, lent their voices to those of Amy’s line workers to demand better treatment and conditions.

After eight months of discussions between Amy’s Kitchen food line workers in Santa Rosa, California, representatives of F.E.P., and executives at Amy’s Kitchen, agreements were made to not only improve the working conditions for the food line workers in Santa Rosa, but the company also acknowledged those who were abruptly let go at the now-closed Amy’s Kitchen facility in San José.

“Over the past eight months of collaboration with the Food Empowerment Project, Amy’s is pleased with the learnings and progress we’ve made together,” said Paul Schiefer, President of Amy’s Kitchen, Inc. “This collaboration has facilitated productive discussions about how we can better meet our workers’ needs and enhance our communication. We look forward to continuing this positive dialogue and making meaningful improvements for our workforce.”

Regarding the sudden closure of the facility in San José, Schiefer added: “While the circumstances that led to the closing of our San José plant two years after opening were challenging, we deeply regret any disruption and pain it caused in the lives of our valued employees. This was a difficult decision in response to a challenging economic climate following the pandemic. We have learned valuable lessons from this experience and are committed to improvement going forward.”

Some of the agreements made by Amy’s Kitchen include a commitment to:

• • Not using labor relations consultants now or in the future.

• • Having bilingual employee service representatives at each plant who are trained to support employees in navigating their benefits, including healthcare, and conducting focus groups at each location to better understand what employees want and need and increased communication and presence in front of employees at town halls, table events, and focus groups to help employees utilize all their benefits with ease.

• • Worker safety and well-being. The company is committed to achieving zero accidents or injuries, and they are committed to continuing to find ways to collaborate among Amy’s Safety team, the People Department, and all their team members. They want their employees to suggest ways the company can improve safety and to know that they are empowered to intervene and speak up if they see an unsafe situation. Amy’s will continue regular safety risk assessments and reviews.

• • A 3% merit increase budget for their employees in 2024 with a new review process: if any employee is recommended to receive less than a 3% merit increase, there will be an additional level of review by the department manager and People Department to ensure that the process is fair to all. In addition, exploring whether pay increases based on factors other than merit are both practical and feasible, and Amy’s will seek feedback from employees via focus groups before making any changes.

F.E.P. will remain in contact with the workers at Amy’s to ensure the permanence of these decisions and their treatment. In a year, F.E.P. will revisit to see if the wages of the workers have increased and to see if employees will be receiving a cost-of-living increase.