A crowd of concession-stand workers formed in protest outside the Ohio Stadium at 10:20 a.m. today as football fans prepared to watch Ohio State face off against Indiana University.

The protesters, who began gathering as early as 3:30 a.m. in the parking lot at the corner of John H. Herrick Drive and Olentangy River Road, have grown to a group of 22 employees, accompanied by Service

Employees International Union members, hoisting signs including “Sodexo UNFAIR: Clean up Sodexo.” Other signs accused Sodexo of unfair labor practices.

The protesters descended on Ohio Stadium at 10:20 a.m., chanting, “O-H-I-O clean up Sodexo” while shaking rattles made of empty plastic bottles and rocks, and banging bass drums. Many were donned in purple labor-union attire and circled the Ohio Stadium repeatedly.

Ongoing disputes between Sodexo Inc. and its employees, who provide food and cleaning services to universities, hospitals and athletic facilities, culminated in the recent employee-approved authorization of strikes at several locations, including OSU.

Reactions among football fans who passed the protesters has ranged from confusion to anger.

 

Sodexo employees say the France-based company treats them unfairly.

“I cry sometimes to think about the time I spend away from my family, knowing I still don’t make enough to support them,” Said Amy Lawhead, 34, a stand supervisor who has worked for Sodexo on-and-off since 2002. “I don’t feel like I should work this hard just to be disrespected and overlooked.”

 

Sodexo employees at the Columbus Crew Stadium organized a walkout Saturday, Oct. 2, a week before the Ohio Stadium strike.

Joe Musick, 20, a stand supervisor at Crew Stadium, said earlier in the week that he and his co-workers walked off-site “in response to the unfair labor practices, the treatment of (his) fellow co-workers and everything that has happened.” Alfred King, spokesman for Sodexo USA, said in an e-mail prior to today’s strike, “There was no disruption of services at Crew Stadium, and only a small number of employees participated in this labor action against Sodexo.”

 

Musick disagreed.

“The managers were mostly panicking,” he said, adding that a portion of the auxiliary workers joined the strike. “There was a little bit of chaos inside when I was there.”

Laurie Couch, spokeswoman for the labor union, said Sodexo is mistreating its employees.

“Workers are on strike because they have been illegally threatened and retaliated against for trying to form a union,” she said.

King said such claims are unfounded.

“Allegations that Sodexo interferes with employees attempting to unionize are false,” he said in an e-mail.

Couch said the wages Sodexo pays its employees aren’t enough.

“They make as little as $7.50 an hour,” she said. “Most of them have no access to health care, and many of them qualify for food stamps and welfare even though many of them work as many as 60 to 70 hours per week.”

King said the wages and benefits Sodexo offers are more than adequate.

“Sodexo provides competitive wages, and our benefits eligibility for front line employees is the most liberal in our industry,” he said in an e-mail.

Ohio State President E. Gordon Gee said the conflict does not involve the university.

“This is not our fight,” Gee said during a meeting with The Lantern editorial board Wednesday. “This is between Sodexo and the Union.”

No Sodexo employees were fired from Crew Stadium in response to the strike. One was written up for an unexcused absence from work, for which Couch said the union will file a complaint against Sodexo.