Wayfair Employees Plan a Walkout After Learning the Company Reportedly Sold Furniture to Detention Centers
On Wednesday, employees of Wayfair are planning a walkout in response to learning that the online retailer has reportedly sold furniture to at least one facility meant to detain children at the border.
This is according to the Twitter account @wayfairwalkout, which started posting on Tuesday around 11:30 ET. The account has retweeted the employee letter that was sent to Wayfair management, detailing their requests that the company stop doing business with the contractor that’s furnishing the camps.
“Over the last two days it has come to our attention that Wayfair has again engaged in B2B sales with BCFS, a non-profit government contractor managing camps for migrants at our Southern border,” the letter reads. “This particular order, for over $200,000 worth of bedroom furniture, is destined for Carrizo Springs, TX, to a facility that will be outfitted to detain up to 3,000 migrant children seeking legal asylum in the United States.”
They also retweeted the company’s response to the employee letter, which states that “[a]s a retailer, it is standard practice to fulfill orders for all customers and we believe it is our business to sell to any customer who is acting within the laws of the countries within which we operate.”
The walkout is scheduled for Wednesday, June 26 at 1:30 p.m. ET in Boston’s Copley Square, unless the employee demands are met. According to the letter and tweets, the group is asking that the company cease all current and future business with contractors participating in the operation of migrant detention camps, establish a code of ethics when dealing with B2B partners that is in line with Wayfair’s core values, and donate the $86,000 in profit from the aforementioned sale to RAICES, an immigration legal services non-profit based in Texas.
Wayfair did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Apartment Therapy.
As of this writing, the hashtag #WayfairWalkout is trending on Twitter in the United States.