Workers back antidumping petition
By Powell Slaughter -- Furniture Today, August 4, 2003
Galax, Va. — Workers at three case goods manufacturers here gave near-unanimous support to the antidumping efforts of the American Furniture Manufacturers Committee for Legal Trade by signing the group's petition last week.
Not surprisingly, 98% of employees at 16 plants operated by Vaughan Furniture, Vaughan-Bassett Furniture and Webb Furniture — 3,229 out of 3,305 workers — put their names on the petition, set to go to the U.S. Department of Commerce and International Trade Commission this fall. Workers absent the day of the signing can add their names later.
Since management at all three companies supports efforts to curb alleged dumping of Chinese-made wood bedroom furniture, why have factory workers sign the petition?
"The people in the factories ... have asked to express their opinion, and we're going to give them the right," said John Bassett, president and chief executive officer of Vaughan-Bassett.
He said the workers' voice is what counts with DOC and ITC. "Even if management changes its mind, we are bound to move forward because their petition is stronger in the government's eye than our decision," Bassett said.
Workers at the Vaughan-Bassett plant said they appreciated the opportunity to make their voices heard.
"Everybody's real concerned and worried about keeping their job and keeping the work here," said Pat Shupe, a 10-year employee working in quality control on Vaughan-Bassett's bed line. "It makes me real proud to be working with John Bassett."
Four-year employee Margaret Hanks, who works on assembly with her husband, Chester Hanks, a 23-year veteran, doesn't want a repeat of her experience in other jobs. Furniture is the third industry she's worked in where domestic production shrank in the face of offshore sourcing.
"First it was electronic capacitors, which went to Japan," she said. "Then I was in the apparel industry, and I lost my job when it went to Mexico."
John Bassett said antidumping efforts should have begun four or five years ago, but few managers knew there were laws on the books that could help them until recently.
"I blame people like myself — I was an American Furniture Manufacturers Assn. president," he said. "Are we late? The answer is yes. Are we too late? The answer is no."
The committee's campaign will cost in excess of $1 million, Bassett said. Member companies lend financial support based on the percentage of domestic wood bedroom furniture they shipped in 2002. After starting in mid-July with 15 members, the committee counted 25 companies by press time.
While the petition technically is not political, the movement is garnering the support of elected officials, and that won't hurt, said Doug Bassett, vice president of sales at Vaughan-Bassett. Already in hand are letters of support from Virginia Sen. George Allen, Virginia congressman Virgil Goode Jr. and North Carolina congressman Richard Burr.
"We haven't even gone after elected officials hard yet; they're already asking us what they can do," Doug Bassett said. "(DOC) is supposed to judge this on the merits of the case, but they're also interested in the amount of support in the industry and among the public."
While almost all employees signed the petition, several withheld their names.
"One woman told me she didn't think she would sign the petition," John Bassett said. "I told her, 'Don't worry, you vote any way you want.' This is America, and people are free to express themselves without worrying about their standing at this company."
