JBS Workers To Return To Work As Company Agrees To Resume Negotiations
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 4, 2026
CONTACT: Carla Wyatt | cwyatt@ufcw7.com | 303.425.0897 ext. 410
JBS WORKERS TO RETURN TO WORK AS COMPANY AGREES TO RESUME NEGOTIATIONS
Negotiations will resume late next week after three-week strike ends on April 7, 2026; Workers remain united to secure a fair contract.
Greeley, CO – United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 members at Greeley’s Swift Beef Company, owned by JBS N.V. (NYSE:JBS) will return to work after JBS agreed to return to the negotiating table. The strike originally began at 5:30 a.m. on Monday, March 16, 2026. Thousands of workers have joined the picket lines every day, with workers demanding the Company to return to the table and negotiate fairly.
UFCW Local 7 President Kim Cordova announced that JBS agrees to meet on April 9 and 10 to resume contract negotiations, and as such, workers will return to work for shifts starting at or after 5 am on April 7, 2026. Despite JBS’s efforts to deceive workers and the media as to the plant’s status, the plant has been almost completely idle with only a miniscule fraction of production occurring at quality levels far below that which skilled union workers can produce.
UFCW Local 7 President Kim Cordova, the Union’s chief spokesperson, stated, “Workers remain united and will continue to fight until JBS fully ends its unfair labor practices and gives workers a contract offer that protects them, shows workers the respect they deserve, and pays them a livable wage. This fight will continue and workers can take strength from the community members, farmers and ranchers, and elected officials who have joined them in this battle. We will not stop until JBS rectifies the suffering it has brought on these workers and the American people as a whole.”
In January, JBS and other large meatpackers paid a reported $200 million to resolve allegations that the companies had unlawfully conspired to suppress wages in beef processing nationwide. This settlement comes on top of other multi-million-dollar settlements in suits brought against the Company by farmers, ranchers, and customers. In its proposals at the negotiating table, JBS has likewise sought to limit workers wages and has instead insisted on wage increases of barely 1.5% on average per year, far below both historic and anticipated inflation. Indeed, recently the OECD updated its US inflation forecast to project that prices would rise by 4.1% in 2026 – far higher than earlier forecasts. Meanwhile, since late 2021, JBS has increased healthcare contributions for workers nationwide by as much as 37% while workers’ wages have risen less than 7% over the same period.
In February, after months of negotiations, workers voted overwhelmingly to authorize an unfair labor practice strike against JBS as a result of the Company’s refusal to negotiate fairly with workers and fix the company’s pattern of wage theft, provide raises to workers that keep pace with the rising cost of living in Colorado, and ensure stable health care costs for workers. Instead of shifting toward fair treatment, the Company has recently doubled down on its illegal tactics by threatening to discontinue their healthcare benefits, and by threatening workers with termination if they did not resign from the Union and refuse to strike.
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Local 7, is the largest private-sector Union in Colorado and Wyoming. It is affiliated with the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union which represents over 1.3 million workers in the United States and Canada, one of the largest private-sector Unions in North America. UFCW members work in a wide range of industries, including retail food, food processing, agriculture, retail sales, and health care.
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