Apple Retail workers are unionising. We’ve come together to demand better working conditions at the world’s wealthiest employer, because good enough, isn’t.

Our members are currently working on:

• Fairer disciplinary procedures

• To end disability discrimination

• For fair pay that keeps up with increasing living costs

• To protect jobs from automation, outsourcing and stealth-layoffs

• To end union busting

All workers should have access to the representation and collective bargaining power that comes with a trade union. Join us to get involved with building a strong, worker-lead union branch, get involved with grassroots union organising in UK Apple Stores and for the support of our growing dedicated team of Apple Store union reps.

UTAW@Apple in the news

• Taking on Big Tech — Tribune — Dec 2023
• UK Apple Store workers detail ‘union-busting’ tactics — Computer Weekly — Oct 2023

• ‘Overworked and unhappy’ Apple Southampton store staff want to unionise — Apple Insider — September 2023

• Apple’s ‘Union-Busting’ Tactics Have Come to the UK — Novara Media — May 2023

• Inside the London Apple Store workers’ unionization efforts - Fast Company — Dec 2022

• How the Apple Store Union Movement Came to The UK — Huck — Oct 2022

Why do we need a trade union at Apple?

A union gives us, Apple workers, the voice, the power and the legal rights to come together and collectively negotiate with our employer. We want to make our workplace better for everyone.

If we are recognised as a union, Apple has to engage with us in collective bargaining. This means they are required to sit down and formally negotiate with workers over issues such as pay, shift patterns and contractual terms, issues we don’t otherwise have any say in.

A union makes the relationship between workers and the company fairer

As well as collective bargaining, a union also allows us to elect and train union reps in each store to help resolve workplace issues, such as disciplinaries and grievances.

A union also allows us to protect ourselves from our employer if it makes bad decisions, or puts its profits ahead of its people. Apple Stores are undergoing a Quiet Downsizing with Apple using stricter enforcement of policies to dismiss workers in disciplinaries while not backfilling the roles. It’s using AI technologies to analyse attendance and sickness patterns in order to justify dismissing workers on the grounds of Incapacity, it’s outsourcing device repair work to cheaper depot labour in the Czechia and has removed roles in store roles like Schedule Planner which have been replaced by smaller centralised scheduling teams.

Union members want Apple Stores to be the best place to learn about Apple products, with highly trained, knowledgeable, passionate workers who are experts in their field. We want to protect services such as Today At Apple, which provided quality free learning from our incredible Creative team members, which has been scaled back significantly.

How do we get there?

In order to be recognised as a trade union at Apple, Apple can either recognise us voluntarily or we can force Apple to recognise us on a statutory basis.

So far, workers at Apple White City and Apple Southampton have sent letters to management asking Apple to recognise union workers on a voluntary basis. Voluntary recognition would demonstrate a commitment from Apple to engage with workers in good faith. So far, in both cases, Apple has failed to recognise these workers or negotiate in good faith in a series of meetings where Apple attempted to delay and discourage while simultaneously trying to spread anti-union misinformation in stores.

In order to bring about union recognition on a statutory basis, we need to show that most of the workers in any given store in support of unionisation. The easiest way of doing this is simply to have a majority of staff in stores be active members of the union. We are currently working in our stores all over the UK to build support and membership numbers. We are growing in members rapidly and encourage all Apple retail workers to join. Put simply the more of us who join UTAW the quicker we’ll unionise Apple Retail.