Chadbourn Hosiery Mills, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

May 10, 1950

89 N.L.R.B. 1256 (N.L.R.B. 1950)

In the Matter of CHADBOURN HOSIERY MILLS, INC., EMPLOYER and
AMERICAN FEDERATION OF HOSIERY WORKERS, PETITIONER
Case No. 34-RC-171.-Decided May 10, 1950
DECISION
AND
DIRECTION OF ELECTION
Upon a petition duly filed, a hearing was held before Miles J. Mc-
Cormick, hearing officer. . The hearing officer's rulings made at the
hearing are free from prejudicial error and are hereby affirmed.
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3 (b) of the National Labor
Relations Act, the Board has delegated its powers in connection with
this case to a three-member panel [Chairman Herzog and Mem-
bers Reynolds and Styles].
Upon the entire record in this case, the Board finds :
1. The Employer is engaged in commerce within the meaning of
the National Labor Relations Act.
2. The labor organization involved claims to represent certain em-
ployees of the Employer.
3. A question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9 (o)
(1) and Section 2, (6) and (7) of the Act.
4. The appropriate units :
The Petitioner seeks a single unit of all employees, excluding clerical
'employees and supervisors, at the Employer's finishing operation,.
known as Plant No. 4, and the greige goods operation known as Plant
No. 6, at Charlotte, North Carolina, or, in the alternative, a similar unit
at the finishing operation alone. The Employer contends that the
appropriate unit should consist of all greige' goods plants, five in
number, in various cities, but concedes that a separate unit for the
finishing plant only would be appropriate.
The Employer's operations in Charlotte are carried on in a two-
story rectangular building. The finishing operation is now located
on the first floor. Here the hosiery is received in the greige state from
89 NLRB No. 157.
1256
CHADBOURN HOSIERY MILLS, ' rw'c. 1257
all five greige goods plants, and dyed, stamped, paired, boarded, and
packed for shipment. A coordinating and mending section is also
part of this operation. The finishing operation is under the direction
of a plant manager, who reports directly to the vice president of the
Company.
The greige goods operation is now located on the second floor of
the Charlotte building, except for one new 60-gauge knitting machine
which has been placed on the first floor because of its excessive weight.
It is the ultimate intention of the Employer to locate the entire
knitting operation on the first floor and the displaced finishing opera-
tion on the second. In the manufacture of greige goods the Employer
operates 22 knitting machines used for the manufacture of ladies' full-
fashioned hosiery. The operations carried on are knitting, looping,
seaming, inspecting, and mending. This operation is under the over-
all supervision of a plant manager, who reports to the manager of the
full-fashioned division. There are supervisors for each of the 3
shifts in the knitting room and for the auxiliary operations.
Applicants for employment in either operation are screened by the
central employment office of the Employer, but the applicants are then
sent to each of the managers, who have the right to hire or reject any
applicants sent to them. The two operations are physically separated
by walls and floors for the most part. Each has its own payroll, and
functions separately as to accounting and organization. The record
does not disclose any interchange of employees between the two op-
erations and special training would be necessary before any such
interchange was feasible.
As the parties are in substantial accord as to the appropriateness
of a separate unit for the finishing operation, we find that such a unit
is appropriate for the purposes of collective bargaining
The Employer contends, contrary to the Petitioner's apparent desire,
that the only appropriate unit for its greige goods operations should in-
clude all employees at each of its separate plants. In addition to
Plant No. 6 discussed above, the Employer operates grreige goods plants
at Burlington, Silar City, and Midland, North Carolina, and Shenan-
doah, Virginia. Each of these plants has separate supervision under
a plant manager. There is no interchange of employees between the
plants; their distance from Charlotte varies from 22 miles to 305
miles: In view of the absence of interchange of personnel, the separate
supervision , and the geographical location of the;plants, we find, con-
trary to the contentions of the Employer,2 that a unit of employees at
1 Waldensian Hosiery Mills , Inc., 85 NLRB 758; id., 74 NLRB 315.
z We note that the Employer recently agreed on the appropriateness of a unit at the
Shenandoah plant and to a consent election there.
1258 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the Employer's greige goods operation known as Plant No. 6 in Char-
lotte, North Carolina, is appropriate for the purposes of collective
bargaining.3
There remains for consideration the question of the inclusion or
exclusion of the "table supervisors" or expeditors in Plant No. 4. The
Employer would exclude and the Petitioner include them. The table
supervisors or expeditors work in the coordinating department, where
the job functions are assigned to groups of four employees : a matcher
who pairs the goods, a reweaver who fixes or pulls threads out of the
hose, a classifier who measures and counts the stockings, and an ex-
peditor who coordinates and directs the work of the table. The ex-
peditor sets the pace and remains at her table at all times. She is
paid on a piecework basis, as are the other girls at the table, but she
receives extra compensation depending upon the production of the en-
tire table. The expeditor has no authority to hire or discharge, and
can only recommend an independent management investigation when
she wishes to remove a girl at her table. In the event that any girl
at a table is absent for a day, that entire table, including the expeditor,
is sent home and is not paid. Unlike these expeditors, all supervisors
have weekly meetings and are not paid on a piecework basis. The ex-
peditors have met together at the Employer's behest with these super-
visors on only one occasion, for the purpose of seeing a training film.
As these expeditors have no authority to hire or discharge, and as their
recommendation carries no substantial independent weight, we find
that they are not supervisors. We shall therefore include them in the
unit 4
We find that the employees in groups No. 1 and No. 2 listed below
constitute units appropriate for the purpose of collective bargaining
within the meaning of Section 9 (b) of the Act:
1. All production and maintenance, employees at the finishing op-
eration known as Plant No. 4, Charlotte, North Carolina, including
expeditors but excluding fixers, office clerical employees,' and all super-
visors within the meaning of the Act.
2. All production and maintenance employees at the greige goods
operation known as Plant No. 6, Charlotte, North Carolina, excluding
3 See Sani-Aqua Shower Curtains , Inc., 88 NLRB No. 218.
4 Pacific (has and Electric Company, 87 NLRB 257.
5 The manager of Plant No . 4 has a payroll clerk who has no other duties than the
preparation of the payroll. She works in the main office of the Company. In accordance
with the agreement of the parties we shall exclude her from the unit as an office clerical
employee.
,CHADBOURN HOSIERY MILLS, INC. 1259
and all supervisors within the mean-fixers, office clerical employees '6
ing of the Act.
DIRECTION OF ELECTION
As part of the investigation to ascertain representatives for the
purposes of collective bargaining with the Employer, an election by
secret ballot shall be conducted as early as possible, but not later than
30 days from the date of this Direction, under the direction and super-
vision of the Regional Director for the Region in which this case was
heard, and subject to Sections 203.61 and 203.62 of National Labor
Relations Board Rules and Regulations, among the employees in the
units found appropriate in paragraph numbered 4, above, who were
employed during the payroll period immediately preceding the date of
this Direction of Election, including employees who did not work dur-
ing said payroll period because they were ill or on vacation or tempo-
rarily laid off, but excluding those employees who have since quit or
been discharged for cause and have not been rehired or reinstated
prior to the date of the election, and also. excluding employees on
strike who are not entitled to reinstatement, to determine whether or
not they desire to be represented, for purposes of collective bargain-
ing, by American Federation of Hosiery Workers.
8 The payroll clerk in Plant No. 6 works in the office of the manager for tlly .t plant. Her
duties are to tabulate information which is cut into a card for the IBM payroll machine.
As the parties are in agreement that she is an office clerical , we shall exclude her from the
unit.