In light of the recent debacle involving the campus petition to reform and improve the dining hall service for resident students, it may serve the current campaign to take notice of the company’s known history in recent years. As a warning to those who might be easily upset by the graphic details involved in Aramark’s incident track record, this article might not be for you.
While Aramark has been the subject of external complaints for many years, one issue that is given less attention is the labour relations issues. In a few instances, Aramark has fired workers for reporting unsanitary food conditions while being provided with low wages, unpaid hours, neglected backpay, and firing employees making EEOC claims.
The company also has an extensive history in the private prison industry, where a great portion of the corporation’s contracts are made. Among these contracts, in Burlington County Jail, Aramark was serving “substandard and spoiled [food], and often made prisoners sick with diarrhea and vomiting”. These findings were made by Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, in 2013.
Similarly, prison conditions were worsened in another contract at Parnall Correctional Facility where maggots were discovered in food areas, and likely caused an outbreak of food-borne illness. Identical contamination concerns had been reported in both the Ohio Reformatory for Women, and the Trumbull Correctional Institute around the same time. Despite these issues being brought to light, the Michigan Dept. of Corrections appears to have cleared Armark of any responsibility for inmate illness or pests in Michigan, and it is unclear why.
More recently, in April 2015, the Cavalier Daily, the University of Virginia’s student newspaper, revealed that the company had “served garbage” to prisoners at Saginaw Correctional Facility in Freeland, Michigan. Additionally, they had “underfed inmates and fed them dog food, worms, and food scraps from old meals”, arguing on this basis that the university should accordingly reconsider its business with the food provider. Also contained in the same source, a leaked company email, “[the] prison food provider served cakes nibbled on by rats.“
Aramark has also had a history of overcharging clients: state governments of Michigan, Kentucky, and Florida have had skewed prison food pricing for low-grade food which reportedly caused a prison riot in Kentucky.
In other correctional facility contracts, Aramark faced controversy in 2015 when Ohio inmates working in kitchen settings under their management conducted a strike “because they were required to cut meat with pan lids instead of being allowed to use meat slicers.” Multiple accounts of inappropriate conduct with prisoners (sexual, letter writing, and contraband smuggling) have also been made in this same facility. Over two hundred and four employees have been banned from entering Ohio prisons. Ohio continues to renew the contract, despite the union head of Ohio Civil Services Employee Association stating “[Aramark] continues to violate their contract every day with food shortages, health and safety violations, bad employee conduct, low food quality.” A year prior, in 2014, Aramark was penalized with a total of $272,000 in contract violations fines. Later that same year, nine employees were fired for violating contraband regulations and another fifteen for violating security codes.
As previously mentioned, and well known by residence students, prison contracts are not the sole source of the company’s business. In 2015, Aramark received an annual $2.65 million dollar custodial contract for maintaining the Wichita Falls Independent School District. The contract was promptly eliminated shortly after, when one of the schools under the contract had become infested with rats and mice after a County Public Health inspection. Janet Powell, the district’s Director of Support Services said, “Everyone on the committee felt lied to and deceived (by Aramark).”
Just this month, the University of Manitoba seemed to be struggling with issues similarly faced by MUN students. As reported by Jacob Singleton of the Manitoban, “The red flag of revolution yearns to be hoisted… in the name of healthy, delicious and sustainable grub on our campus.” However while it may remain unclear how long Aramark intends to stay on Memorial Campus, University of Manitoba’s contract is not set to expire until 2024.
While Singleton makes a great observation, it’s also noteworthy that the corporate atmosphere appears to be equally dissatisfied with the current performance. While Aramark has raked in $14.6 billion during 2018, the organization has long been plagued by hostile takeover attempts.
Elected CEO Joseph Neubauer, a Republican Party member from Mandatory Palestine, defended the company during 1984 during a failed coup. Neubauer would later go on to lead a group of investors to buyout outstanding shares and complete a merger in 2007, while fulfilling the role of VP of PepsiCo and Chase Manhattan Bank. It appears that in his absence the company has been pushed towards regime change by some Wall Street analysts.
While a town hall meeting was held by MUNSU on March 28th, its concerns might echo the pessimism expressed by those who remember a similar attempt at intervention during 2015. As MUNSU grapples with the situation, it appears as though a wider company issue may be on the horizon. Considering the concerns raised by previously mentioned universities, in just the past few months, three different universities in Ireland have launched a boycott campaign over Aramark’s conduct with regards to “direct provision centres”.
These centres reportedly operated under ethically dire circumstances which involved the mistreatment of refugees and asylum seekers. While the matter is ongoing, it had started with a hunger strike in 2014. The crisis reached a low point when Aramark was compelled to publicly apologize to a Zimbabwean mother for withholding food from her sick child.
It is unclear whether or not these independent movements to oppose Aramark’s dubious services are aware of one another, but if coordinated, a mass-mobilization could spell a dubious future for the company. This danger to the organization could only be worsened when coupled with the threats made by the corporate sector now hanging a buyout over their heads. This, in the midst of a managerial law suit over thousands of withheld bonuses, provides a vulnerable moment for the company.