A recent employee meeting at Tesla’s Berlin-Brandenburg Gigafactory focused on union pressure following the company’s most recent union elections and the 65,000 mugs that have disappeared from the factory.
At a staff meeting a few weeks ago, Andre Thierig, Tesla Giga Berlin’s manufacturing director, said that as many as 65,000 mugs had disappeared from the factory since production began in March 2022, reported German newspaper Handelsblatt, which obtained an audio recording of the meeting.
“I’ll just give you the numbers,” Thierig said at the conference on July 4 (via DW). “Since we started production here, we’ve bought 65,000 coffee mugs. 65,000! Statistically speaking, each of you already has five IKEA coffee mugs in your home.”
“I’m so tired of approving orders to buy more coffee cups,” he added, as employees laughed and applauded.
As of press time, Thielig has not yet responded to a request for comment on Teslarati’s mug, but he did refer to the original article in a recent post on his LinkedIn page. Instead, he deflected attention from the recent media attention surrounding the mug, and instead moved on to Giga Berlin’s new Giga Gym for employees.
“While the world is obsessed with our mugs, we are actually taking care of our most important asset at the Gigafactory: our employees,” Thierig wrote in the post. “We’ve listened to their feedback and are finally completing our state-of-the-art employee facility.”
“Today we celebrated the pre-opening of Giga Gym! Definitely one of the coolest spots in the whole factory. Great design and great work from all the teams involved. Looks like it’s going to be fun!”
Handelsblatt’s report also provides details about Giga Berlin’s trade union elections in March, which were also one of the topics discussed in the recorded meeting. Since then, some employees at the plant have expressed negative feelings towards the IG Metall union, including Michaela Schmitz, who was re-elected as trade union representative.
“I’m trying to glamorize this,” Schmitz said during the meeting. “Unfortunately, we have labor committee members here who tend to be exploitative from outside the union.”
“And they’re trying to assert union interests in the process. Of course, ultimately, this is what keeps us from achieving great things for you again.”
The news comes after IG Metall’s candidates won the most seats in works council elections in March, but fell short of a majority.
IG Metall’s candidate received 3,516 votes in the election, while the candidate from rival group Giga United received 3,201. A third group, called the One Team, received 1,106 votes. Thierig thanked employees for the very high turnout and for choosing not to unionize Giga Berlin.
“In the just-concluded works union council elections, the vast majority of employees voted against the works union council,” he wrote in a LinkedIn post. “I would like to thank all employees for the high voter turnout, close to 80%, and for an independent future for the Berlin-Brandenburg Gigafactory. We will continue to overcome all challenges together.”
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