Sofina Calgary: An Offer of Settlement Update

Your Union Bargaining Committee has continued to advance your concerns and demands at the bargaining table throughout this round of contract negotiations and reiterated their importance when we met with the company again on January 27, 2026.

While we have made progress on several issues across several areas, the company has continued to table proposals that your Committee believes are detrimental and could have a serious negative impact on its employees.

To put it bluntly, many of those proposals are outright shocking.

We had hoped that through discussion, the company would listen to your concerns, but that didn’t happen. The company has tabled what we believe is their first complete offer of settlement. They are calling it a “final offer,” and it still contains those shocking proposals.

Note that we’re not convinced that this offer is truly “final.” It’s not uncommon for employers to talk this way before there’s a strike vote, for example. And after strike votes, you’re more likely to see how the employer really feels about bargaining. It’s an unfortunate fact that selfish and greedy employers will often not make realistic offers until people threaten not to show up for work. 

This is an excellent example of a company offer that simply isn’t realistic. Aside from a substandard offer on wages of $2.90 over 5 years, the company continues to push proposals that could significantly change scheduling, the overall work environment, and your access to union rights and representation. These include:

• Introduction of 10 and 12-hours shifts
• Weekend shifts
• Use of a part-time workforce
• Moving to a schedule which includes weekends
• Introduction of a Tuesday to Saturday shift
• Reduce the rest period between shifts from 10 hours to 8.
• Reduction of the ability to have a shop steward present with you in meetings
• Loss of the weekly guarantee if you take a leave of absence
• Introduction of language that would allow the company to not pay you the guarantee of hours in certain circumstances

Under the terms of this offer, an employee could lose their biweekly hours guarantee not only if they take even a one-day leave of absence — such as personal and family responsibility leave — but even due to an “act of nature”.

An “act of nature” could include a bird flu outbreak. It could include severe weather, such as extreme wind or cold , that prevents birds from being transported from the farms to the plant.

Your bargaining committee strongly believes that the terms in this final offer do not address the membership’s needs and, in many ways, make your conditions at work worse.

Comparisons to Other Plants

While the company stated that it is advancing the same financial offer as the turkey plant in Edmonton, we don’t believe this reflects market realities.

The turkey industry is struggling and is seasonally tied to certain holidays. Meanwhile, the chicken industry is thriving, particularly as consumers continue to move away from beef and pork.

This has significantly improved Sofina’s profit margins and bottom line to the point that they have been able to partner with the Blue Jays to get their food into the stadiums and purchase another national poultry processing company, Exceldor. This does not include other European acquisitions they have made in recent years.

We believe that Sofina has an obligation to take care of and invest in their own workers — who have made them achieve record profits — before spending millions on sponsorship deals or buying another company.

While your Bargaining Committee feels strongly that this offer does not address your concerns, we felt it was important to bring it back to the membership so you can see it.

You can download a copy of the offer HERE.

Information Meetings & a Vote

“I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again. You need a decent raise. You deserve a decent raise. And Sofina can certainly afford to give you a decent raise,” says President Thomas Hesse. “Your Bargaining Committee does not believe the company’s offer is good enough, and, frankly, neither do I.”

“But the decision is yours to make,” continues Hesse. “I urge you to turn out to the information meetings and make your voice heard by voting. Whatever you decide, your union will have your back.”

Next week, we will be holding information meetings to allow you to come out and speak to the Union’s officers. You can hear their thoughts on this offer, and we will be conducting a vote. This will be an opportunity to send a strong message to the Company that this offer is not good enough.

Details

INFORMATION MEETING
Tuesday, February 17, 2026
1:30 PM and 4:30 PM
Glenmore Inn

IN PERSON VOTING
Saturday, February 21, 2026
12:00 PM to 4:00 PM
Glenmore Inn

ONLINE VOTING
9:00 AM on Monday, February 23, to 9:00 AM on Wednesday, February 25, 2026.

Please note that your union requires a valid email address to be able to participate in the online voting process. If you are unsure if your union has your correct email address, please contact our office to update your contact information.

If the membership votes to reject this offer, we will proceed to mediation.

For a full printable copy of this update and the offer of settlement, click here.

Posted on: February 10,2026