Workers at the Amy’s Kitchen factory in Santa Rosa have filed a complaint with the California Division of Occupational Safety and Health, with allegations that have put the beloved Bay Area food brand’s feel-good credo to “share in the love” into question.
The Cal/OSHA complaint, filed Jan. 20, follows an NBC News investigation in which Amy’s workers at the Santa Rosa plant allege unrelenting managers, poor working conditions and demanding production mandates.
One worker told NBC News that workers on the production line are expected to produce more than 25,000 plates of food in a single 8-hour shift. The complaint alleged that workers were not given time for water or bathroom breaks because of the expectation to meet these demands.
Another worker said working at Amy’s felt like she’s “in a cage because they’re always checking us and there are cameras.”
The OSHA complaint, according to NBC News, listed locked fire exits and hostility from managers when safety concerns are raised.
Some even reported injuries that were left untreated or ignored by supervisors, resulting in chronic pain. Ines De la Luz, an employee interviewed by the outlet, said she was forced to remove an arm brace to go back to work despite being unable to move her hand.
“We shouldn’t be living in pain, working in pain and constantly having pain,” she told NBC News. “We don’t want to be treated like donkeys anymore.”
Injured workers, according to the report, were put to work cleaning cafeterias in what was allegedly called “the corral” internally.
The brand has been headquartered in Petaluma since 1987 and was valued at nearly $500 million as of 2017. Beyond its initial frozen food products, the Bay Area company has four Amy’s Drive-Thru locations — with plans to expand beyond California.
Within the past five years, Amy’s California operations, according to an OSHA database of workplace misconduct, have been hit with eight separate labor violations deemed “serious” by OSHA. The company is required to pay nearly $90,000 in fines — all these violations have been contested by the company.
The working conditions have spurred a unionization effort led by the Teamsters Local 665 union. Flyers passed outside of the Amy’s Drive-Thru location in Rohnert Park demanded that Amy’s Kitchen founders Andy and Rachel Berliner meet with staff and the union to improve working conditions and compensation.
The Berliners denied the claims made in the NBC News report. In a letter addressed to “our friends and family” posted on the Amy’s website, they said the allegations do “not reflect who we are as a company and the values we uphold.”
The letter also said that injury rates at Amy’s are “well below others in the industry.”
“We want all Amy’s employees to feel like they are being taken care of, and we are deeply saddened to hear about the experiences these five employees have described,” the letter reads.
A representative for Amy’s did not immediately respond to a request for comment from SFGATE.
SFGATE food reporter Susy Guerrero contributed to this report.