More than 100 of the company’s 320 employees, mostly members of the Teamsters Local 812 union, walked out of the job four weeks ago after months of unsuccessful negotiations. They say their employer, distributor Clare Rose Inc., implemented a new beer selling system that could result in a 30 percent cut to drivers’ wages through differences in base pay and commission.

But the bigger issue is that Clare Rose wants to eliminate its pension plan. Under the new terms, employees would have the option to participate in a 401(k) rather than collecting a defined benefit each month after retirement. No one would lose the pension money they’ve already earned, but from here on in the retirement benefit package would change.

Teamsters 812

Joe Vitta, Secretary-Treasurer of Teamsters 812, says that getting rid of the pension would mean drivers walk away from $1,000 a month upon retirement. “[Clare Rose is] claiming that they don’t believe in defined benefits anymore and that our plan is underfunded and would go broke, which is not true,” he explains. To underscore the stability of the multi-employer plan the union uses, he adds that Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and AB-InBev have all successfully negotiated contracts with Teamsters 812.

“It’s a money grab. That’s all it is. The third generation family took over the business, we never had a problem with this company in the sixty years we’ve had a contract with them,” Vitta says, adding that strikes like this are rare—the last one he remembers was in 1989 against a Pepsi distributor. “That’s usually what happens when they attack every core economic issue in the contract.”

Vitta says Clare Rose’s attorney sent out a letter on the first day of the strike informing employees that they would be permanently replaced. For now, management and nonunion employees are filling in the gaps, driving the trucks and delivering the beer themselves. The strikers maintain a Facebook page of their delivery mishaps. Photos include spilled beer and one shot of a Clare Rose truck that evidently crashed into a light pole. Vitta says the company is busing in workers from out of state. “Most normal people wouldn’t want to cross the picket line. These are professional scabs, people that can’t get jobs anywhere else.”

Teamsters 812

But the conflict is far from over. The union has filed complaints at the National Labor Relations Board and encouraged action from the Industrial Development Agency (IDA) in the town of Brookhaven, which gives Clare Rose hundreds of thousands of dollars in tax breaks each year. The IDA has launched an investigation into the distributor’s employment practices, and the company could lose those tax breaks if it is found in violation of its contract with the town.

Clare Rose, which was featured as a top distributor in Beverage Executive in 2011 for selling $202 million worth of beer, did not respond to requests for comment. But it did post a “Facts About the Strike” page on its website, which claims that more than half of the striking employees would’ve received a raise under its latest offer (but doesn’t provide much more detail). The post defends management’s position on the pension as well: “We proposed to pay the Teamsters [sic] failing pension fund millions of dollars to exit (before conditions worsen)” it reads. Vitta admits that the union pension plan is currently at a deficit, but says that he presented Clare Rose with a rehabilitation plan that estimated 100 percent funding by 2034.