Although Huerta’s tactic became part of a larger strategy used in the boycott, it did not always work elsewhere. In Los Angeles, for example, LeRoy Chatfield and a former farm labor contractor, Joe Serda, led the boycott against the second largest supermarket chain in the country, Safeway. Chatfield and Serda’s initial approach mirrored that of Huerta’s campaign: topple the largest chain, and the others will follow. To their chagrin, however, the large, boisterous demonstrations they staged in front of markets just upset a conservative clientele. Serda could not believe the response: “I was shocked. Most of the people would roll up their car windows and gun their motors right by us.” These responses differed from those in New York City, where many working-class consumers belonged to unions and declared their allegiance to the UFW. In his report from Los Angeles, Serda told Brown, “Even many of the union members here are conservative and racist.” In front of some stores, customers occasionally spit at picketers and yelled at Mexicans on the picket line “to go back to Mexico.”40
Safeway’s own business practices contributed to the sentiments of its customers. The company—referred to derisively by some employees as “Slave-way” for its treatment of workers and union-busting politics—fought the boycott vigorously and took out full-page ads in the Los Angeles Times challenging the legitimacy of boycotters to speak for workers in the fields.41 In the summer of 1968, during the key months of the table grape harvest, Chatfield, Serda, and volunteers at the Los Angeles boycott house shared little of the momentum enjoyed by Huerta in New York.42
Farther up the coast, in Portland, Oregon, the boycott team used Huerta’s approach against the supermarket chain Fred Meyer, but also discovered new strategies. Lead by a former Giumarra picker and Migrant Ministry member, Nick Jones, a small number of volunteers “introduced the highways [or] human billboard idea.” The idea involved placing several volunteers on highway bridges adorned with body-length signs promoting the boycott. Jones admitted to balking at the tactic initially, although he encouraged those who wanted to experiment to try. “It’s one of those times … that I really blew it. I [said], ‘it’s bullshit. Nobody’s going to respond to that, it’s just a waste of time.’” Within five minutes of taking to the freeways, however, Jones discovered how wrong he was. “People were letting loose of their car wheels and looking up at us and giving us the fist and the ‘V’ and the finger. I mean we were getting a real definite response out of everybody … to the point where they were looking and they had to hit their brakes to keep from hitting the car in front of them.” In time, the human billboard strategy traveled across the country, where volunteers in Boston used it to great effect.43
In Toronto, Marshall Ganz adopted a slightly different approach, a combined strategy of appealing to unions for cooperation, picketing, diplomacy, and, when necessary, acts of civil disobedience. He began by making overtures to the Amalgamated Meat Cutters Union for support, but the union could promise only to make the boycott an issue in future negotiations with Canadian markets. Union organizers experienced far greater success appealing to Toronto consumers, who showed much sympathy for the farm workers’ struggle and responded favorably to Toronto media coverage of the boycott. Consumers tended to show greater support for the boycott in locations where chain stores rather than independents dominated the grocery market landscape. Toronto was one such place, with more than 85 percent of food sales concentrated in four stores: A&P, Loblaw’s, Dominion, and Steinberg’s. Unfortunately for Ganz and the boycotters, Canada also maintained laws against picketing in store parking lots, a lesson they learned when police arrested the president of the Canadian Labor Council for trespassing when he attended a public rally for the UFW in front of one of the chains. The law forced Ganz to make a decision: either engage in civil disobedience in an attempt to change the law, as he had done in Mississippi several times, or pursue a different approach. Based on his experience in the civil rights movement, Ganz understood that the former often took many years to achieve results. Changing the law was not the primary goal; applying economic pressure in the service of the farm workers and achieving victory in the fields of California were. Consequently, Ganz had to devise an approach that did not squander the goodwill of the public while avoiding becoming embroiled in a legal battle on foreign soil.
Ganz adapted to local conditions through a combination of diplomacy and creative protests that played on public sympathies. Rather than approach the most obstinate storeowner first, he made a private appeal to Sam Steinberg, an owner who had a reputation for being fair with his employees and had already stated his support for the grape strike. Ganz reminded Steinberg of upcoming contract negotiations with the Amalgamated Meat Cutters Union, whose president had expressed his displeasure at handling scab grapes from California. Deciding to observe the boycott, Ganz argued, would give Steinberg an advantage in dealing with the union representing his workers and competing with other markets that showed no signs of complying with the boycott. To convince Steinberg of public opinion in support of the UFW, the local boycott committee directed Ontario residents to send letters or visit the market personally to express their intentions not to shop at his store as long as he continued to sell grapes.
Unlike his competitors, Steinberg and his legal advisor, Irving Levine, showed respect for the union. During the negotiations, Steinberg turned to Levine for guidance. Levine had recently returned from a trip to California to inspect the fields for himself and reported, “Conditions are feudal.” According to Brown, this information moved Steinberg: “He [told] us, ‘We are not going to handle grapes anymore. In fact, we’re going to put color signs of the fields up at our empty grape bins to explain to our customers why we’re supporting the grape boycott.’”44
Other stores, however, resisted such appeals. Dominion, the largest of the Canadian chains, openly flaunted its disdain for the boycott by refusing to meet with Ganz while defending customers’ “freedom to choose” whether to buy grapes. In response, the boycott committee bypassed the parking lots for the interior of the stores. Once inside, boycotters engaged in “creative nonviolence” by filling their basket, wheeling it to the front of the store, then leaving without making a purchase. The stunt upset store managers who had to assign workers to reshelve merchandise.
In another action reminiscent of the theatrical protests by the emerging Youth International Party, or Yippies, boycotters carried helium-filled balloons into the store with the message “Don’t Eat Grapes” written on them, and distributed them to children while letting others float to the ceiling. When managers ordered employees to pop the balloons, confetti carrying pro-UFW messages rained down upon the store, causing another mess and infuriating store managers. In response to the protests, Dominion executives questioned the legality of such actions and publicly labeled Ganz and his merry group of pranksters “union goons.” The press, which had been called in anticipation of the theatrics, covered the balloon incident in a sympathetic tone that swayed public opinion toward the union. On one Toronto radio broadcast, a local deejay composed and delivered the following poem:
If all the goons popped toy balloons
And sprayed us with confetti
Then cops and crooks would use dirty looks
And guns that shoot spaghetti.45
Soon after that broadcast, Dominion retracted its denunciation of the boycotters and agreed to suspend the sale of California grapes indefinitely.
Volunteers celebrated such victories but also valued the day-to-day excitement of building a movement within a given city.