After the commercial tour, the main connection for the production workers begins –

Over the course of several days in October 2021, as members of IATSE’s unionized film and television crew threatened to go on strike, the producer and production supervisor, who were working on a large commercial job, considered taking a stand.

Erin Wiley and Cheyenne Cage worked on a multi-million ad campaign for a major tech company that pushed them to the limit: the production required long hours and long commutes, coordinating multiple takes and avoiding the threat of bad weather. While the production team was asked to put more on their plate. (Weil and Cage declined to publicly name the companies involved, but the hollywood reporter (Filming details confirmed with other project workers.) Finally, three days after filming and after they said they raised concerns that were not addressed, Wiley and Cage resigned, and the project’s assistant production manager, production. He was followed by assistants, the COVID compliance team, and the script supervisor.

It was a great decision as commercial production teams are not unionized and some of these employees rely on close relationships with companies to find work. Cage sent an email he had sent to the campaign’s executive producer asking for “fair and humane treatment” to several colleagues, and news of the rare production team’s departure soon spread widely. Cage says he and Will received “hundreds” of emails and many phone calls about their actions. To continue the conversation about working conditions, the couple organized a virtual “town hall” the following week, which was attended by hundreds of people. “Erin and I said, okay, now something’s up,” says Cage. “From there, we continued with the host cities that gradually became more and more organized.”

Thus began Stand With Production, a working group founded by Wiley and Cage that now seeks to unite members of production departments on television commercials with IATSE. The group, which will publicize its union efforts on Thursday, seeks to bring production assistants, production assistants, production supervisors, electricians and bidders into the national union. They are currently collecting union authorization cards and eventually want to seek voluntary recognition from the Association of Independent Commercial Producers (AICP), which deals on behalf of independent commercial production and post-production companies with unions, but has yet to receive an application. . (IPCA declined to comment at this time.)

Stand With Production made the decision to attempt a staged merger. In the original group’s council in 2021, more virtual meetings followed, and Wiley and Cage began to speak face to face with the production staff, who generally handles the logistics of filming television commercials while managing the assumptions and communicating with the production company of the project. , agency and client. Inspired by one of these conversations, a group of Stand With Production members wrote a set of “Manufacturing Guidelines” detailing work standards for production units that the group believes should be implemented across the industry. The guidelines suggest a daily rate of payment that the group finds acceptable and how these rates may increase as the cost of living increases; They also present proposals on how to remunerate workers who work more than 12 hours a day and/or work 6 or 7 days a week. More than 1,700 production workers and industry supporters signed a petition in support of the guidelines, and Stand With Production urged its members to ask employers to respect the guidelines in labor negotiations. (Initially, the group planned a strike linked to the guidelines, but later scrapped the idea; however, the guidelines and the threat of a strike “gave us a little bit of political clout” and increased wages for some workers, Wiley says.) ) Stand With Production has also compiled a database of the names, contact information and regions of thousands of industry workers.

In late 2021, Stand With Production members began contacting various associations, including IATSE, to explore options for the group. Still, feelings about whether or not the band would reunite were mixed: Line producer Josh Jupiter notes that he initially felt “very negative” about the reunion from the start, while assistant producer Hank Hartnell says it showed. bandwidth to get together (now both are supported on the IATSE connection disk). Also, “I think most of the group felt it would be difficult to go to the location because we’re spread all over the country,” says Wiley.

According to the group, several organizations, including Communications Workers of America, have expressed interest in speaking with the group, but IATSE has made the most convincing move to unite them with the organization. The union proposed an effort to bring together all the functions that Stand With Production was involved in, to organize on a national scale and let Stand With Production run it. (THR The CWA was contacted for comment.)

At the end of the IATSE, it was unusual for a group that had already touched so many worker bases to come up with a list of desired labor standards. “It’s unusual but welcome to have this level of organization before the actual union campaign starts,” said a source close to the union.

While Stand With Production organizers and supporters say the concerns they want to address about the union are chronic, the problems have arisen during a pandemic. Like the film and television members of IATSE who authorized a fall 2021 strike, the group wants to introduce more rest periods, response times and safety training, arguing that COVID-19 has put more pressure on its production teams. Also, members say they want to raise standard rates because their salaries haven’t kept pace with inflation over the years; Several roles that the group wants to consolidate are also currently not overtime. Supporters seek access to union health and pension plans (many AICP employers already offer health insurance to some non-union commercial freelancers through the Producer Health Benefit Plan, but Stand With Production members say their requirements eligibility criteria are strict). The group also hopes to establish diversity and inclusion and mentoring and training programs.

“The pandemic really showed us all the cracks in our system,” notes Jupiter. He believes the union can “respect the times and be realistic about what we as humans can do with our time”.

In a statement, IATSE International President Matthew Loeb noted that many of the issues workers hope to resolve “are the same issues this union has fought for over decades of collective bargaining.” He added that many IATSE members work in advertising and “their [Stand With Production’s] The fight is our fight.”

Still, Cage says Stand With Production wants to preserve its members’ relationships with production companies and not engage in “contentious battles” as they organize themselves. Some of the roles that Stand With Production and IATSE are trying to bring together, such as line builders, production supervisors and bid makers, can be contracted directly from manufacturing companies. In addition, commercial production workers often switch from one job to another and, as a result, many of them rely on close relationships with companies throughout their careers. The Stand With Production team says they consulted with some of these companies during the organization: “We understand that everyone who works in advertising, regardless of role, is under pressure,” says Keith Garchow, founding member and associate director of production at Support With Production. Support With Production. “They are [employers] Accept irrational demands that happen to others. So what this movement does is allow them to have a solid foundation to repel these irrational demands. “

This is not the first time commercial workers have sought union coverage. Several years ago, production supervisors, assistant production supervisors and IATSE Local 871 argued in IPCA arbitration that these functions should be covered by a local commercial agreement. The workers involved were trying to address some of the same problems that Stand With Production is trying to address now: high demands on producers, reduced working hours and low salaries, says Chris Valdez, a production supervisor who participated in the effort in this moment. . Sources say that with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic THRThe effort failed, the AICP struggled with the number of cases shelved and the number of workers supporting the cause dwindled. This parallel letter was eliminated during contract negotiations held in 2019.

Due to his previous experience trying to get union contract coverage, Valdez was initially skeptical of the Stand With Production group. However, after meeting and learning from the organizers, IATSE supported the TV commercial effort and became a supporter. This time, the record “had a big hit because it’s the last hit,” he says. “If it doesn’t happen now, it never will. People are taken to extremes…so it’s all or nothing.”