USW District 1 Statement on Libbey Glass Negotiations

Contact: Tony Montana, tmontana@usw.org

(Toledo) – Donnie Blatt, USW District 1 Director, made the following statement after negotiations with Libbey Glass today:

“The United Steelworkers (USW) District 1, on behalf of our members of Locals 59M, 65T and 700T, met with representatives of Libbey Glass on August 21, 2025, to try and resolve outstanding issues of the ongoing contract negotiations. The employees at Libbey Glass made significant sacrifices in their pay and benefits to bring Libbey out of bankruptcy and liquidation in 2020. The cost of their sacrifice totaled about $31.8 million. Then the USW worked with the Company and the U.S. Department of Energy for another $45 million grant, to help the Company restructure and reorganize. Now that the Company is on good financial footing, they are coming back again to take more from their employees. Not because they need it, only because they want it.

“The employees at Libbey Glass deserve more. The Union bargaining committees have made reasonable proposals to settle the contract and Libbey Glass is only interested in gutting the collective bargaining agreement to take away decades of gains the employees count on. The Company has refused to bargain in good faith and has refused to show the Union why they need the concessions they continue to demand. Despite the USW’s good faith efforts today to resolve outstanding issues, Libbey Glass walked away from the table, claiming that there was nothing left to talk about. USW District 1 stands with our members that saved Libbey Glass and urges the Company to come back to negotiations and bargain a fair and equitable contract.”

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The USW represents 850,000 workers in North America employed in many industries that include metals, mining, rubber, chemicals, paper, oil refining, the service, public and health care sectors and higher education. For more information: www.usw.org.