Milprint, Inc.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 5, 1950

90 N.L.R.B. 98 (N.L.R.B. 1950)

In the Matter Of MILPRINT, INC., EMPLOYER and MILWAUKEE PRINTING
PRESSMEN AND ASSISTANTS' UNION No. 7, AFL, PETITIONER
Case No. 13-RC-901.Decided June 5, 1950
DECISION AND ORDER
Upon a petition duly filed under Section 9 (c) of the National Labor
Relations Act, a hearing was held before John P. Von Rohr, 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 Act, the Board
has delegated its powers in connection with this case to a three-member
panel [Chairman Herzog and Members 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 Act.
2. The labor organizations involved claim to represent employees
of the Employer.:'
3. No question affecting commerce exists concerning the representa-
tion of employees of the Employer within the meaning of Section 9 (c)
(1) and Section 2 (6) and (7) of the Act, for the following reasons :
The Employer, at its plants involved here, is engaged in commercial
printing and lithography of catalogues, display, and packaging ma-
terials such as cartons, wrappers, and bags. The Petitioner makes sev-
eral alternative unit requests. In order of its preference, these are :
(1) The pressmen and assistants in the rotogravure press department;
(2) all employees in the rotogravure press department; (3) pressmen
and assistants in the rotogravure and aniline press departments; and
(4) all employees in the rotogravure and aniline press departments.
The Employer and the Intervenor contend that none of the proposed
units is appropriate.
The Employer is a member of an employer association which bar-
gains with the Petitioner for pressmen and assistants in the letterpress
departments of all its members. The Employer has bargained directly
I United Paper Workers of America, Local No. 356, CIO, herein called the Intervenor,
was permitted to intervene at the hearing. The Amalgamated Lithographers of America,
CIO, bargaining representative for a unit of lithographic department employees , was served
with notice of hearing, but did not seek to intervene.
90 NLRB No. 16.
98
MILPRINT, INC. 99
since 1935 with Amalgamated Lithographers of America, CIO, for
all employees in its lithographic department, and has bargained with
the Intervenor since 1937 for the remaining production and mainte-
nance employees.
Rotogravure printing is done with an etched or engraved steel cylin-
der which rotates in a bath of ink. Excess ink is wiped off by a blade,
leaving ink only in the etched depressions of the cylinder, from which
it is transferred to the material being printed.2 Steel cylinders used
in rotogravure printing are first copper plated and polished. A photo-
graphic image is transferred to the cylinder, which is then etched and
chromium plated as the final step in preparation for its use on the
press. The photographic image is prepared in the lithographic de-
partment, but the plating and the etching of the cylinders are done in
the rotogravure engraving department.
The rotogravure press department has five large and very expensive
presses, of which four are located together on the seventh floor of Plant
4; the fifth press is on the third floor of the same plant, immediately
adjacent to the foil mounting department, whose foreman supervises
its operations. This press is engaged exclusively at the present time
in printing bottle neck labels on laminated foil prepared in the foil
mounting department.
The Employer pioneered in the development of a process using pig-
mented aniline ink, and has given it the trade name of Lustro printing.
A separate department, known as the aniline press or Lustro depart-
ment, is devoted to this process. There the presses print from rubber
plates mounted on cylinders. As in the case of rotogravure, the
photographic images imprinted by this process are initially prepared
in the lithographic department.
The Employer also has a bag department where printing presses,
operated on the same principle as those in the aniline press department
are attached to bag forming machines. The printing done with the
bag machines is simpler than that produced on the presses in the
aniline press department because, on the latter type of press, the
material to be printed is in a continuous roll which is rewound after
printing is completed. The pressmen on the bag machines are required
to watch only single printing impressions, while the pressman on
the other aniline ink presses must watch and be responsible for, the
quality of all impressions on the entire width of the roll going through
2 This form of printing differs substantially from both letterpress and lithographic
printing. In the former , the raised portion of a plate or cylinder is inked and the impresson
is imparted by the raised surfaces . In lithographic , or offset, printing, the inked cylinder is
smooth , but chemically treated so that ink adheres only to certain parts of the surface. The
impression on the cylinder is transferred to a rubber blanket from which it is then offset
to the material being printed.
100 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
the machine. A bag department pressman needs additional training
properly to operate a press in the aniline press department, but a.
pressman on the latter machine could operate a bag press satis-
factorily after only a few days' experience.
Although pressmen on either the rotogravure or aniline ink presses
require at least 3 years of training for full proficiency, they cannot
be transferred from one type of press to the other without a long
period of additional training. The Employer has no formal appren-
ticeship program for the pressman in these departments, but has
trained and promoted practically all of them from less skilled occu-
pations in the plant. Many of the semiskilled and unskilled job
classifications, such as floorman and stockman, are found in all the
press departments, and transfers, both temporary and permanent, be-
tween departments are common for employees filling these jobs. Oc-
casionally, pressmen and assistant pressmen are transferred to simi-
lar classifications in other departments. More frequently, however,
transfers of pressmen arise from operation of the contractual seniority
provisions, and consist of the demotion of pressmen to lower positions
in the same or other departments.
The Board has frequently recognized that printing pressmen
exercise craft skills, and has accorded them the opportunity of obtain-
ing separate representation despite a history of collective bargaining
on a broader basis.3 We have done so even though the pressmen were
able to operate only a single type of press. There is no doubt as to the
skilled character of the work performed both by the rotogravure and
aniline department pressmen. They exercise approximately equiv-
alent degrees of skill, although the operation of their presses is dis-
similar. We are satisfied, however; that the pressmen in the bag
department are also skilled craftsmen whose proficiency in the press-
men's art is similar, though in a lesser degree, to that of the Lustro
department pressmen. The Petitioner does not seek to represent the
bag department pressmen. As we will not find appropriate a craft
unit that embraces only a segment of those who exercise comparable
craft skills, we will not direct an election to sever either (1) the
rotogravure pressmen, or (2) the rotogravure and aniline depart-
ment pressmen, from the existing unit which the Intervenor repre-
sents 4
There remains for consideration the appropriateness of the Peti-
tioner's remaining two unit requests: (3) All employees in the roto-
Paterson Parchment Paper Company, 80 NLRB 1378.
Although it appears that a unit composed of the pressmen and assistant pressmen in'
the rotogravure , aniline, and bag departments would be appropriate , we shall not direct an
election in such a unit at this time, because the Petitioner has not made a sufficient admin-
istrative showing of interest among these employees.
MILPRINT, INC. 101
gravure press department or (4) all employees in both the rotogravure
press and Lustro departments. The Petitioner described these as
departmental units having a craft nucleus of pressmen. We have
found appropriate a few so-called "departmental" or "industrial proc-
ess" units in the printing industry, such as the lithographic and bind-
ery room departments. This type of unit has been found to be ap-
propriate because based upon a traditionally recognized, well inte-
grated segment of the graphic arts industry, rather than merely on the
fortuities of the employer's administrative organization. Here the
Petitioner does not seek a unit exclusively based on the rotogravure
process or on a process involving the use of pigmented aniline inks,5
nor is it shown that such a unit, if requested, would conform to any
of those traditionally recognized in the industry as appropriate for
separate representation."
As the Petitioner's alternative unit requests neither encompass an
entire craft, nor are based upon any traditionally recognized segment
of the printing industry, we find that the requested units are inap-
propriate for purposes of collective bargaining. We shall accord-
ingly dismiss the petition.
ORDER
The National Labor Relations Board hereby orders that the peti-
tion herein be, and it hereby is, dismissed.
G None of the proposed units includes employees engaged in the preliminary processes of
.plate engraving or preparation of the rubber mats on which the photographic image is
Imposed.
6 Cf. Lloyd Hollister, Inc., 55 NLRB 32; Con P. Curran Printing Company, 57 NLRB 185;
Foote t Davies, 66 NLRB 416; Manz Corporation, 79 NLRB 211.