Labour Behind The Label

On 22nd April, join anti-sweatshop activists from around the world at Footlocker stores across Europe and the US to call on them to drop adidas from their stores until they pay ex-PT Kizone workers the $1.8million they are owed in unpaid severance. This will mark the beginning of a week of action in the UK that will ramp up the pressure on the UK’s biggest retailer of adidas footwear.

Actions are already planned across the country and more will be announced soon. Click on the dots on the map below to find out more about the action in your area.

Footlocker represents a key source of profit for Adidas internationally and, as one of Adidas’ biggest retailers, they could play a huge role in getting them to pay up, so we’re demanding they stand up and call on Adidas to ensure these workers are paid what they are owed.

Join the Footlocker International Day of Action on 22nd April, take action another day that week, or if you really love workers, every day that week.

If there isn't an action already listed then why not organise your own? Find out where your nearest Footlocker store is located, get a group of friends together and take action!  This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it that you are organising an event and we'll send you an action pack and add your event to the map below.

And if you can't come along at all (or even if you can) then join us virtually by taking part in our Thunderclap action. This will help us get the message out by highlighting the campaign on hundreds of facebook and twitter pages, coinciding with the shop actions taking place on the 22nd April.

View Map of Footlocker Actions in a larger map

In the Action Card we are calling for long-awaited severance pay to be given to workers at PT Kizone and for Edinburgh Woollen to step up to ensuring safety in their supply chains.

Worker rights activists in the US, UK and Germany have delivered a petition signed by 50,000 international supporters demanding that adidas pay US$1.8 million in severance owed to 2,800 workers from its former Indonesia supplier, PT Kizone. Activists delivered the petition to adidas’ US headquarters as well as flagship retail stores in the UK and Germany.

An offer by adidas to donate food vouchers to Indonesian workers owed millions of euros has been described as "downright insulting" by union representatives and labour right campaigners. The workers, previously employed at ex-addidas supplier PT Kizone, have been fighting for over a year to get adidas to pay the 1.5 million euros still owed to them in unpaid severance.

Adidas' offer: a food voucher worth just 35 pounds.

Entis and his wife Heni both worked at the Kizone factory until it closed. Heni worked there for eleven years, and Entis for about the same. They have three children: an eighteen-year-old boy, a fourteen-year-old girl, and a five-year-old girl.

Just days after demonstrations took place in Indonesia, Europe and the US demanding adidas pay $1.8 million to former PT Kizone workers, adidas asked to meet with the district level union, which represents the majority of PT Kizone workers, and the factory-level union. This is the first time it has agreed to meet with the union body that the majority of workers have chosen to represent them.

June 8, 2012: This morning 30 activists from Labour Behind the Label, People and Planet, UK Feminista and War on Want protested outside adidas' Oxford Street sotre to demand they pay $1.8 million in outstanding severance pay to 2,800 Indonesia workers left unemployed following the closure of their factory in April last year. The action was part of an international day of action in support of PT Kizone workers, which marked the beginning of Euro2012, of which adidas is the main sponsor.

In January 2011, the owner of PT Kizone in Indonesia fled, resulting in the closure of the factory in April the same year, and leaving 2,800 workers without work and the severance pay they were entitled to. Sportswear brand adidas had been sourcing from PT Kizone for many years, where workers were paid as little as US$ 0.60 an hour.

So far adidas are refusing to pay a cent towards the compensation fund for PT Kizone workers.

Take action today! Fill in the form below to call on adidas to step up its game on workers' rights and demand justice for Kizone workers.

Re: PT Kizone (Indonesia): Outstanding severance payments I am writing to you to share my deep concerns regarding the payment of money owed to workers at your former Indonesian supplier, PT Kizone. I understand from Labour Behind the Label that PT Kizone in Indonesia closed in April 2011 after the owner fled the country. This has left 2800 workers without employment and owed US$3.4 million in severance entitlement. They are unlikely to be able to claim this money through any legal process. As a long standing buyer at PT Kizone adidas had responsibility for ensuring the factory was operating in a manner that was compliant with Indonesian law, international labour standards and adidas' own code of conduct. It is clear that adidas failed to do so as no funds to pay the workers’ severance were available. Therefore adidas now has responsibility for rectifying these violations and ensuring workers are provided with the severance pay to which they are legally entitled. Other buyers from the factory have now paid a total of US$ 1.6 million towards these debts, but adidas have so far refused to contribute. I am therefore calling on adidas to pay the remaining US$ 1.8 million plus interest to former PT Kizone workers. PT Kizone workers have spent many years producing goods for adidas and deserve to have their rights respected. As a consumer I am interested in the working conditions provided at your production sites. I therefore urge you to: pay the workers the outstanding US$ 1.8 million severance payments including interest; to offer the unemployed former-PT Kizone workers jobs at the same contractual conditions and not to discriminate against anybody because of age, demands made to adidas or other criteria; these jobs must be close to their homes to avoid tearing families apart; to engage positively in this process with the union representing the majority of the workers, DPC SPSI TSK; to act in accordance with the principle of due diligence in the future employment of these and other workers. Yours sincerelyYou must send a letter of some sort

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In January 2011, the owner of PT Kizone in Indonesia fled, resulting in the closure of the factory in April the same year, and leaving 2,800 workers without work and the severance pay they were entitled to. Sportswear brand adidas had been sourcing from PT Kizone for many years, where workers were paid as little as US$ 0.60 an hour.

In July 2011, other buyers at the factory announced that they would contribute US$ 1.6 million to a fund to compensate workers, roughly half of the US$ 3.4 million that was owed to them. To date adidas has refused to contribute to the fund. Now, a year after the factory shut down, the workers are still legally owed the remaining US$ 1.8 million in severance plus interest, which means former workers are incurring debts to survive and may be unable to keep sending their children to school.

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Workers making Olympic sportswear for London 2012 for top brands and high street names including Adidas and Next are being paid poverty wages, forced to work excessive overtime and threatened with instant dismissal if they complain about working conditions, according to a new report.