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A number of messengers had responded to the sluggish pace of the union drive, and the lousy economy in general, by starting their own companies. Over the past five years, more than a dozen small firms like Jet Set and Godspeed have sprung up to compete with established biggies like Pro Mess. The small outfits -- managed by people whose own bike seats are still warm -- tend to be more generous with pay and benefits. One, Cupid Courier, is run as a cooperative.
Some messengers fear that over time, these little firms will grow and their owners will become just as ruthless and intransigent as those of the bigger firms. They cite the example of Flash, which was started by an ex-messenger.
"No man's absolutely good or absolutely evil. Without some kind of contract, if it's the standard hierarchical structure, then it's going to have the same boss-power relationship as the old companies," says ex-SFBMA Executive Director Bernie Corace.
But other messengers see the little firms and their more sympathetic owners as a solution to the industry's problems. And if a growing number of messengers can work for decent small firms, who needs the union?
Over breakfast, the ILWU legal eagles warned Green and Dall that not only were wage and OT lawsuits costly to the union, but they might even trigger the collapse of some financially shaky firms, says Green. Obviously, that would mean fewer jobs for messengers -- and fewer members for the ILWU.
Green and Dall later reconvened over barbecued brisket at a Lower Haight restaurant. There they hit on a different strategy. They decided to file wage and OT claims with the California Labor Commission instead. Let the state pick up the tab for actually suing the companies. And if the firms couldn't afford to pay, screw 'em.
On Nov. 22, 13 bike messengers and drivers filed $100,000 in back wage claims against several outfits. "Mainly," writes Green in an e-mail, "we want to get as many messengers to file as many claims with as many regulatory agencies as possible, until these motherfuckers obey the law."
The new suits, concedes Green, represent a tactical shift away from trying to unionize the industry. Now, the goal is just trying to get the companies to follow existing rules on paying their people.
But one man's tactical shift is another's tactical retreat. In any event, it's clear that the ILWU campaign has bogged down.
Dall, who works at Western Messenger Services -- one of the biggest outfits in the city -- says the union is nowhere near having majority status there. "Nellie" Nelson, who works at First Legal, has tried to rally her co-workers to undertake "some kind of action" in protest of what she claims are continual violations of labor law by her company. But, she admits, it's "surprisingly hard" to get people to take even a half-day off work to help organize.
In the best of times, it's still no picnic to unionize a messenger company.
"You may spend two years of your life working towards something you're not going to reap the benefits of," says Bernie Corace. "But it has to be something that's not a vague concept like 'raising the bar.' It has to be, 'I'm helping my friends. The people I live with. The ones who help me get dates!'"
But these days -- in a town where a pitcher of good beer costs $12, a grubby studio apartment goes for $800 a month, and almost everybody knows somebody who's out of work -- it's even tougher to organize.
"People," says Dall, "really tighten up and get scared and don't want to rock the boat when the economy tightens up."
