From: URBNcommunity
Sent: Tuesday, October 06, 2015 12:01 PM
Subject: A Call For URBN Volunteers!
A Call for URBN Volunteers!
URBN is seeking weekend volunteers to help out at our fulfillment center in Gap, PA. October will be the busiest month yet for the center, and we need additional helping hands to ensure the timely shipment of orders. As a volunteer, you will work side by side with your GFC colleagues to help pick, pack and ship orders for our wholesale and direct customers.
In addition to servicing the needs of our customers, it’s a great way to experience our fulfillment operations first hand. Get your co-workers together for a team building activity!
The Details:
Who: Home Office URBN salaried employees
Where: URBN’s Fulfilment Center - 766 Brackbill Road, Gap, Pennsylvania 17527
What You’ll Be Doing: Pick, pack and prepare packages for shipment (please wear sneakers and comfortable clothing)
When: October 17, 18, 24, 25, and 31 Lunch will be provided
Two shifts each day: 9:00 AM - 3:00PM or 12:00 PM - 6:00 PM
(you can volunteer for one or multiple days)
Transportation: If needed, URBN will provide transportation to and from GFC (details provided after sign up)
How: Sign up using this link and we will be in touch with more details. Please do not show up without signing up.
With the advent of the Great Recession, employers quickly discovered that an oversupply of available labor meant that they could require ever more from their employees with little fallout. After all, if an employee objected to higher expectations, longer hours, and/or a lower tolerance for dissent from the company line…well, there were very likely several people ready, willing, and eager to step into the breach.
Over the past few years, some employers have taken this newfound power to truly absurd lengths, making Office Space seem like the quaint parody it is. Urban Outfitters, where the above menu originated, decided to “ask” salaried employees to “volunteer” time on what should be their weekend to help out in the company’s fulfillment center. You might be thinking, “Hey, what a great way for people to make some extra money…and who can’t use that these days, right??” Except that Urban Outfitters isn’t asking for volunteers that they’re planning to pay. They’ve known that being salaried means you can be required to work all the overtime you could possibly want without having to worry about the “inconvenience” of getting paid (well, except for food and transportation)…because it’s a team-building activity!! How motivational!!
This sort of “voluntary” helping out is in many companies nothing of the sort. I don’t know if these “volunteer” opportunities were of the mandatory voluntary nature, but it’s telling that Urban Outfitters is asking for “volunteers” to help support a for-profit enterprise. You might consider “getting to keep their jobs” to be sufficient compensation…if you’re a miserable excuse for a human being.
Don’tcha just LOVE capitalism? Doesn’t the idea of exploiting the proletariat send blood coursing to your nether regions? I don’t know about you, but I hope Urban Outfitters will be investigated and sued by the Labor Department or…even better…that they’ll discover too late that people don’t want to shop at retailers that abuse and exploit employees.
Karma can be a real bitch, knowhutimean?? Then again, Urban Outfitters management knows that if the current crop objects (which it evidently did not, not surprisingly), there are plenty more where they came from who will fall into line.
