MECHANICSVILLE, Md. (August 29, 2023) – Today, workers at Story cannabis dispensary in Mechanicsville, Md. announced plans to unionize with United Food & Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 400.
The worker organizing committee released the following statement:
“We are unionizing because what is happening in the store – the prioritization of profits over people – isn’t right. We cannot stand to see more negative changes being made to our store. We are stoked to fight for what is best for workers and for patients and know we have the strength and community support we need to win. Together we will make Story into the dispensary we know it can be.”
The workers filed for a union election through the National Labor Relations Board this morning after a super majority of eligible employees signed authorization cards in support of unionizing. The union would cover fourteen employees at the Mechanicsville dispensary located at 38105 Three Notch Road.
According to the company’s website, Story operates four dispensaries in Maryland, four in Arizona, and two in Ohio. The Mechanicsville location would be the first union shop in the company nationwide.
The staff at Story Cannabis are joined by other cannabis dispensaries in the region that have recently unionized. On August 11, workers at Zen Leaf in Germantown, Md. ratified their first union contract with UFCW Local 400. In the Baltimore region, workers at the Zen Leaf dispensary in Towson, Md. joined UFCW Local 27 in July, shortly after workers at the PharmaCann Verilife Dispensary in Westminster unionized in June. In 2020, workers at MaryMed, LLC in Hurlock, Md., became the first workplace in the state’s cannabis industry to reach an agreement on a union contract. That same year, workers at DC Holistic Wellness became the first dispensary in the nation’s capital to unionize.
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United Food & Commercial Workers Local 400 is led by President Mark Federici and represents 35,000 members working in the grocery, retail, health care, food processing, service and other industries in Maryland, Virginia, Washington, D.C., West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky and Tennessee. www.ufcw400.org
