Andrew Sage

Yeah.

Every so often in negotiating sessions, Dan or Naid would make some reference to like a financial decision that we were trying to bargain about being like not their choice and being something that would be up to the board.

And we'd be like, so take it to the board.

And they would be like, okay.

And then we would never hear anything about it ever again.

Incredible, incredible work.

Seems like a great tactic to never address anything you're supposed to be addressing.

And so the way that we were negotiating, we were trying to come to terms on things that didn't affect the finances of the store first so that we could land some easy wins and like feel like we were making progress and then address the stuff that we expected to be thornier later.

Yeah.

But then what that ended up being as meetings went on and on was them asking us constantly, but what is it that you guys really are prioritizing?

What is the thing that matters the most to you that you have the least give on?

And we're like, it's wages.

You know it's wages.

It's been wages this whole time.

And they're like, but what if we were asking you to give up all your benefits to get wages that you want?

And we were like, okay, that's not how negotiating works.

Mm-hmm.

And then in an email that labeled it their best and final offer, which is language that they have yet to take back.

They sent us a version of the contract bargaining agreement that we, hey, let me just back up for a second.

When we first started negotiating, they asked us to draft the entire first draft of the collective bargaining agreement ourselves.