Union has eye on Cooper’s Tupelo plant

Cooper Tire & Rubber’s acquisition by Apollo Tyres is expected to close within a matter of months, and the new owner may need to reckon with a unionised plant in Tupelo, Mississippi. According to US industry publication Tire Review, local media have reported the presence of the United Steelworkers union in town.

One local newspaper, the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, shared that USW union organisers met with “several people” at a Holiday Inn Express hotel not far from the plant. A second meeting is also scheduled. The person who organised the meeting declined to disclose its purpose, however it told a reporter “you know why we’re here.” Cooper Tire is apparently aware of the USW’s activities in Tupelo.

Tire Review observes that this would be the third attempt to unionise the Tupelo plant in the past 29 years. The previous two were voted down. Cooper Tire’s other US plants, in Texarkana, Arkansas, and Findlay, Ohio, are both unionised.