Union Fires Walmart Campaigners As Focus Shifts To Media

After firing two top organizers of the Our Walmart campaign, the United Food and Commercial Workers union will focus on media tactics in an “aggressive new strategy.”

Mel Evans / Associated Press

Our Walmart, the union-funded effort to improve working conditions at the world's largest private employer, will be taking a new approach to campaigning after its union backer cut funding and laid off its two most senior organizers.

The four-year old campaign made plenty of headlines as it organized protests at Walmart stores and corporate offices, including actions targeting Black Friday, the busiest day of the retail year. Its members celebrated a small victory in April when the company said it would raise its minimum wage to $10 an hour by next February.

But its main financial backer, the United Food and Commercial Workers union, has decided to change course. Just weeks before the Walmart shareholders meeting in May, it fired two top leaders of Our Walmart, Dan Schlademan and Andrea Dehlendorf, according to multiple sources outside the union. The two, who did not respond to requests for comment, had been instrumental in leading marches, Black Friday actions, and sit-ins at Walmart stores.

In April, the Washington Post reported the union had cut funding for Our Walmart and its sister campaign, Making Change at Walmart, by more than 50%.

The union appears to be shifting its focus to media campaigning, rather than organizing actions on the ground. In May it hired Jessica Levin, formerly of progressive media watchdog Media Matters for America, to run communications for the union and coordinate a new media effort for the Our Walmart campaign. Media Matters rose to prominence as a digitally savvy operator among progressive activist organisations, criticizing "conservative misinformation" in the media.

With Levin on board, the Our Walmart campaign will take a more media-focused approach, advertising on TV, online, and in print.

"With Walmart recently making major communications and management changes, our campaign needed to move in a more aggressive direction," said Our Walmart in a statement via the UFCW. "This next phase, which includes a very aggressive strategy like these ads, is just the beginning."

The first full-page print ad released by the UFCW in this new period of campaigning is set to be published this week in USA Today. "1,117,514 years since humans evolved to walk the earth on two legs," it reads. "The same number of years it would take for the average Walmart employee to earn what the Waltons made last year."

Notably, the phrase "Our Walmart" does not appear anywhere on the ad, although it does include a UFCW logo. A person familiar with the campaign said this was done to ensure there would be "no confusion as to where the message was coming from."

Via UFCW

Our Walmart said the changes will not water down its commitment to on-ground organizing. "Working with employees on the ground to bring attention to working conditions at Walmart will always be a part of this campaign," it said. "The workers are the most important voice in the conversation about the responsibility Walmart has to improve the lives of employees and their families."

The shift in focus comes after the Our Walmart campaign appears to have gained a significant level of awareness within the company. "Walmart's listening," said Tiffany Beroid, an active Our Walmart member and former Walmart worker who attended the recent protest at the company's annual shareholder meeting.

They're listening so closely, she said, that Rob Walton, son of founder Sam Walton and company chairperson since 1992, did an Our Walmart chant from the stage of the shareholders' meeting.

"He said, 'Whose Walmart?' and we shouted back, 'OUR Walmart,'" said Beroid. "That's always been our chant. They have their own chant within the company. He was acknowledging our presence."

A Walmart spokesperson did not reply to a request for comment.

Our Walmart has been one of the more visible players in the "alt-labor" movement, where non-traditional organizing campaigns attempt to mobilize workers in industries where the union movement has been long in exile. The UFCW's changing approach to the campaign is being closely watched by others in the labor movement.

"What we understand is that UFCW has expanded their fight to include all retail workers," said Mary Kay Henry, head of the Service Employees International Union, which backs the Fight For 15 movement to raise fast wood wages.

When asked if the SEIU would consider assisting Our Walmart financially, Henry said the union would offer support in other ways. "We want to help by sharing our digital communications work, help with our members who have gotten to do training with their co-workers. We've been sharing educational materials," she said. "We want to help in whatever way we can to bring union and non-union workers into this fight."

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In-Flight Wi-Fi Will Soon Get Much Faster, Gogo Tells Wall Street

In a presentation to investors, the company said onboard Wi-Fi will hit broadband speeds within five years, and be available on many more flights.

Peter Bartsch / Via Flickr: peterbartsch

The Gogo in-flight Wi-Fi service offered on the majority of U.S. domestic flights will soon get dramatically faster, the company has told investors, with speeds ten times faster than today expected to arrive in the coming five years.

The company's current service isn't fast enough to handle things like streaming video, and can only work over land, not water — and even when it's working, it can slow to a crawl if too many users sign in. But that, the company says, will change as it transitions to satellite antennas and ditches its old air-to-ground technology. That transition, and other lofty goals Gogo has for its service, are planned to be completed in next five to 10 years, according to the presentation, which was filed to the SEC on Monday.

Gogo

On its mission to conquer what it calls the "last frontier of internet connectivity", Gogo has had its fair share of challenges.

There were accusations that the provider—the largest by far in the U.S. aviation market—held an illegal monopoly due to lengthy contracts with the country's largest airlines. Not to mention a barrage of customer complaints over the years that Gogo was too expensive, too slow, and too spotty.

Gogo costs around $16 per day or $59.95 per month, and is available on most of the 80% of domestic flights that have Wi-Fi capability. The company said the satellite system will be much cheaper to operate than current services, but did not specify whether those cost savings will ultimately be passed along to air travelers in the form of cheaper inflight Wi-Fi service.

Among the promises Gogo's CEO Michael Small and CFO Norman Smagley made in their presentation, prepared for their address at the NASDAQ Investor Program, is Wi-Fi speeds of 100Mbps (up from today's peak of 10Mbps) rolled out within five years. Gogo expects those higher speeds, and the higher demand that will come with them, to be the platform for huge growth: it expects the number of planes using its service will rise by 150% by 2033.

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Puerto Rico Governor Calls For "Shared Sacrifices" To Deal With Debt Crisis

The island is in deep economic trouble, and its leader has said it is unable to pay back its $72 billion in debt.

Alvin Baez / Reuters

That means it has no provision for declaring bankruptcy, and it funds its government by issuing bonds in U.S. dollars. Its debt has long been gobbled up by individual and institutional investors in the U.S. because income earned from the bonds is tax free, much like the bonds issued by U.S. municipalities.

But while municipal bonds are only exempted from state and local taxes in the state where the bond is issued, all American investors get state & local exemptions for Puerto Rican bonds.

People ride atop a vehicle waving a Puerto Rican flag during elections in 2012.

Ricardo Arduengo / AP

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The University Of Phoenix Wants Its Reputation Back

Charlie Riedel / AP

Apollo Education, the owner of the University of Phoenix, told wary investors Monday that it would try, once again, to "transform" the country's largest for-profit college chain. The announcement came after the company reported another dismal financial quarter, and two days before the Obama administration's potentially damaging industry regulations are set to go into effect.

The goal, Apollo CEO Greg Cappelli said in an earnings call, is to "repair the reputation of the University of Phoenix," scaling it back in size and cutting some of its worst-performing programs. Enrollments at the university fell by 14% in its most recent quarter.

The transformation plan is one of several the university has rolled out over the years in an an attempt to curb declining enrollments. So far, few have been successful.

"We've tried a lot of things to turn things around, and it hasn't gone to the level we thought it would," Capelli said on the call. "So we're taking next steps."

Apollo stock slid 5% in anticipation of the company's earnings. It was down another 5% in after-hours trading Monday.

The company said it would embark on a "period of transformation" that, in the short term, is likely to further drive down revenue and enrollments. But the plan, the it said, will increase graduation rates and drive down the high loan default levels that have long plagued the for-profit college industry.

At its peak five years ago, Phoenix had some 460,000 students and a soaring stock price. The company is also facing an unprecedented regulatory environment, with a "gainful employment" regulation set to go into effect Wednesday that the company said in its earnings report is likely to affect some of its programs.

Apollo plans to introduce admissions criteria and diagnostic tests, no longer enrolling every student that comes to the school's doors. It will stop letting students start every week, close some campuses, and to cut back on associate's degree programs. Such programs are among its worst-performing, and the most likely to be hit by gainful employment regulations, which will cut federal financial aid for programs that graduate students with high debt loads and low earnings.

On the earnings call, analysts seemed wary of the parts of Apollo's plan that are likely to involve reduce enrollment, eventually leaving the university with around 150,000 students. Every student the school chooses not to enroll is revenue, primarily via federal loans, left on the table

"We know there's short-term consequences to doing this," Capelli said. "We want our reputation back, like we used to have, as a university that has high outcomes."

How McDonald's Is Changing Its Food: One Small Tweak At A Time

The burger chain is making minor but necessary updates to its food to make its menu more appealing. But few think it will be enough to reverse sliding sales.

instagram.com

Shortly after becoming CEO at McDonald's, Steve Easterbrook told investors, "We intend to make meaningful impact with customers and how they perceive our brand and our food." Yet little was said about what, exactly, Easterbrook had in mind beyond the broadly described goal of being a "modern, progressive burger company."

In the months since, clues about what McDonald's executives are planning have slowly surfaced. So far, the strategy taking shape seems to involve making minor adjustments to the existing menu—focusing on aspects of food quality and preparation, as well as price—rather than undertaking a major overhaul.

The changes reflect Easterbrook's intentions to be more nimble with changes, and "move fast with what works and even faster from what doesn't."

Some onlookers see the approach as the right one for the burger giant. "Small menu tweaks and promotions are indicative of the kind of turnaround plan they need," said restaurant consultant Aaron Allen.

First, as BuzzFeed News reported in May, the chain has announced plans to toast its buns five seconds longer to make its sandwiches hotter.

Last week, an internal document revealed it would beef up its quarter pounder to weigh a quarter pound (4 ounces) after cooking, a significant bump up from the current 2.8-ounce cooked patty, according to CNBC. The changes seem to an effort to compete with other "better-burger" chains like Shake Shack and Five Guys that have been stealing customers.

And in terms of value, McDonald's is testing "Mini Meals," which offer lower-cost, sized-down combos with a small drink and fries that cost from $2.99 to $3.99, depending on which burger you choose. These combos offer higher margins, according to Burgerbusiness.com, and for consumers, aside from being cheaper the sized-down meals contain fewer calories — from 520 to 820.

The chain is also offering a double cheeseburger and small fries for $2.50.

The company announced this month that kids-meal orders shifted from sodas to juice and milk over the last year, following the chain's removal of soft drinks from Happy Meal menu boards. While 56% of customers ordered a soda with their Happy Meal prior to the changes, 48% do today.

"We're always innovating around McDonald's food, drinks, and restaurant experience based on customers' preferences, and that includes hotter food and reviewing cooking procedures," spokesperson Lisa McComb said in an email.

It seems unlikely that such changes alone will turn around the company's sliding sales in the short term — and such numbers will become less visible when the company goes through with its plan to stop reporting monthly results after July. Allen said based on what he's seen, "McDonald's isn't doing nearly enough to reverse deep problems with their public perception."

"No one will complain about getting a juicer burger, or a better bun. The question is though, will it be enough to win back customers lost to other better-burger companies," said Allen, who believes there needs to be a greater focus instead on improving McDonald's speed of service, which may be hampered by all these small changes.

"Sure, the quality and nutrition needs to go way up — along with a hundred other things," he said. But, more importantly, "you can never make it too fast or too convenient for consumers."

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Rand Paul Threw A Libertarian Hackathon On Pride Weekend

For liberty, for privacy, and for Rand Paul for President.

William Alden / Via BuzzFeed News

If they ventured outside on Saturday, maybe even took a walk to Dolores Park, the programmers would have been bathed in glorious sunshine and surrounded by rainbow-clad revelers.

Instead, for 24 hours starting that afternoon, smack in the middle of San Francisco's Pride weekend festivities, they sequestered themselves in a harshly lit co-working space in the city's SoMa neighborhood, coding for liberty, for privacy, and for Senator Rand Paul.

His presidential campaign had organized what is known in tech circles as a hackathon — basically, an all-night software-writing orgy — with a political twist. The campaign had challenged the programmers, grouped in competing teams, to make software applications for "protecting liberty and privacy." The winning team would get to meet Paul. The top two would get copies of the Constitution, signed by the libertarian-leaning senator.

The Rand Paul for President campaign cared a lot about this hackathon. Ron Schnell, the campaign's recently hired chief technology officer, told BuzzFeed News it was "a good starting point to ramp up to the most tech-savvy campaign in history," and that it was "pretty much the first thing I started working on" after joining the campaign in May.

Schnell pointed out the event had its own hashtag, #HackForRand. The senator wasn't actually there, but a close-to-life-size foam board cutout was. The image of Paul stared serenely at the programmers with a Mona Lisa smile. Beside it hung two campaign signs: "DEFEAT THE WASHINGTON MACHINE." "UNLEASH THE AMERICAN DREAM."

Ron Schnell, the campaign's chief technology officer.

Brendan Klinkenberg / Via BuzzFeed News

William Alden / Via BuzzFeed News

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Victoria's Secret Is Getting Rid Of On-Call Scheduling In Stores

The chain was at the center of a BuzzFeed News story earlier this month looking at scheduling practices in the retail industry.

Leon Neal / Getty Images

Victoria's Secret is ending the use of on-call scheduling in its stores, employes were told yesterday — a major reversal of a policy that wreaked havoc on the lives of tens of thousands of retail workers across the country.

The chain told employees it would no longer use the controversial scheduling practice, which requires staff to be available for shifts that can be cancelled at the last minute with no compensation, three current and former staff told BuzzFeed News on the condition of anonymity.

It also told staff that they will be notified in advance if upcoming shifts may involve "extensions" that require them to work past their scheduled end time. Workers will also be able to sign up for extra hours if they want them, the ex-employees told BuzzFeed News. Store managers were briefed on the new policies last week.

A source familiar with the company confirmed the changes to scheduling policy. L Brands, Victoria's Secret's parent company, declined to comment.

Victoria's Secret was at the center of a BuzzFeed News story earlier this month for its widespread use of "call-in" shifts — days that an employee needs be available, often until hours before start time, with no guarantee of getting any work or pay.

Victoria's Secret, which is owned by L Brands, was sued for the practice in California last year, in a case that largely centered around whether "reporting for work" includes being available for call-in shifts (and therefore compensation if the shift is canceled).

The judge in that case dismissed the call-in reporting time claim but gave lawyers permission to appeal the decision to a higher court for an authoritative interpretation of what it means to "report for work" under the state's labor laws. At the time, Victoria's Secret declined to comment to BuzzFeed News on its scheduling practices, citing the pending litigation, which is still under way.

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Our Robot Overlords Aren't Quite Ready For Us — Yet

In the booming field of industrial robotics, the race is on to create a machine that can actually replace human workers. But even with the brightest minds in automation on the project, human-less labor is more science fiction than near future.

On a sweltering afternoon in San Jose, California, in the cafeteria of a brand-new building called the Blue Sky Innovation Center, a robot is making a salad. Specifically, it's making a kale salad with goat cheese, blueberries, and sunflower seeds, partially heating the mixture to lightly melt the cheese.

Brendan Klinkenberg and Caroline O'Donovan / BuzzFeed

Brendan Klinkenberg and Caroline O'Donovan / BuzzFeed

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News Corp's Education Company Will Stop Making Tablets

Students using Amplify's tablets.

Amplify.com

Amplify, the education company owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, will stop selling the tablet computers that were once a central part of the company's plan to shake up the education industry, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Despite an almost $1 billion investment by News Corp, Amplify has struggled to gain a foothold in education, which its CEO, Joel Klein, had described as an industry ripe for disruption. Its bright-orange, "ruggedized" tablets were often at the root of its troubles: plagued by technical glitches, the first batch of them was recalled after a high-profile $15 million launch in Greensboro, NC.

Ultimately, few districts bought the devices, and the head of Amplify's tablet business left the company earlier this year. News that Amplify was giving up on the tablets was first reported by Bloomberg.

The devices were Amplify's first product. Billing itself as a hybrid technology-and-education business, Amplify built the tablets to work hand-in-hand with its own digital curriculum.

The company's talk has always been big: Klein said in an interview with BuzzFeed News last year that he saw Amplify's tech savvy enabling it to compete with the education industry's textbook giants, Pearson, Houghton-Mifflin, and McGraw-Hill. The company's "educational DNA," Klein said, gave it an advantage over companies like Apple and Google, whose devices now dominate many digital classrooms.

“There’s a sense that we’re doing something very big and very exciting," Klein said last April.

Amplify's struggles show that in an industry as entrenched as education, disruption, even for well-funded companies, is difficult. Despite talk of a "digital revolution" underway in the education system, the three largest textbook companies remain dominant, continuing to win massive contracts with large and bureaucratic school systems that often prefer to stick with the products they have used for decades.

A source familiar with the matter said the company would continue to focus on its digital curriculum products, which have features like embedded videos and work on a variety of devices. It will also keep pushing a newer line of assessment tools. School districts already using the devices will continue to be serviced by Amplify, the company said in a statement.

Chick-Fil-A Confirms More New York Stores Are Coming

Manhattan will get its third Chick-fil-A restaurant in Midtown, and more are being plotted around the city.

Chick-fil-A

Southern fast food chain Chick-fil-A plans to open multiple outlets in New York beyond the three-story flagship announced in March, according to a presentation made by the company to prospective franchise managers.

In addition to that Herald Square mega outlet, the chain has already secured another location a few blocks south from Rockefeller Center, at 46th Street and 6th Avenue. It's also looking to open additional locations in Manhattan's Upper East Side and the Financial District in the coming two years.

The Atlanta-based company confirmed the plans to BuzzFeed News. "We want ample opportunities to serve New Yorkers great food and remarkable service, which is why we have begun searching for new sites in the area," the company said in an emailed statement.

In Long Island, Chick-fil-A is planning to open an outlet in Port Jefferson this fall, and is exploring locations in Hicksville, Commack, and Westbury.

Chick-fil-A restaurants are concentrated in the Southeast, but the company has been expanding into new regions in recent years, opening about 15% of its stores in new markets. The company has grown to more than 1,900 locations and is the country's largest chicken chain in terms of total sales, surpassing KFC despite its smaller footprint. In 2014, the chain says it made almost $6 billion in sales.

Paul J. Richards / Getty Images

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Lululemon Recalling Dangerous Drawstrings On 318,000 Tops

Just when you thought it was safe to wear an expensive hoodie. Luckily, there haven’t been any serious injuries.

Lululemon is recalling drawstrings on 318,000 women's tops after their elastic cords caused seven face and eye injuries, according to a statement today.

Lululemon's "Sanctuary Jacket" is among those being recalled.

Lululemon / Via cpsc.gov

"When the elastic draw cord with a hard tip in the hood or around the neck area is pulled or caught on something and released, it can snap back, impact the face area and result in injury," the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission said today.

Lululemon / Via cpsc.gov

Extremely vague simulation of the hazard recreated by BuzzFeed News:

(Disclosure: string is not elastic; sweatshirt is not from Lululemon.)

vine.co / Via BuzzFeed

Affected tops were sold between January 2008 and December 2014 and include these styles: Carry and Go Hoodie; Cool Down Jacket; Course-ette Jacket; Cozy Up Jacket; Dance Studio Jacket; Dance Sweat Shirt; Don't Hurry Be Happy Pullover; Gratitude Wrap; Necessity Jacket; Proactive Jacket; Refresh Snap Up; Run Sun Blocker Pullover; Run Track N Field Jacket; Run With It Jacket; Sanctuary Jacket; Savasana Tunic; Sing, Floss, Travel Jacket; Stow 'N Go Jacket; Stride Jacket; Summertime Tunic; Varsity Hoodie; Victory Jacket and Wear With All Jacket. Each top displays an embroidered or printed lululemon logo; the location of the logo varies with the style of the garment.

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Hyundai Under Fire For "Serious" Safety Violations By U.S. Suppliers

Workers calling for health and safety reform at a Hyundai parts maker are a case study in low wages and increased layers of contracting throughout the auto industry.

JUNG YEON-JE / Getty Images

Workers at a car parts factory in Selma, Alabama, evacuated their plant last week after a chemical monitor alarm went off, according Letasha Irby, 36, an employee there. Irby worked for nine years on the production line, making $12 an hour manufacturing foam seat cushions and headrests for Hyundai cars, and experienced many such evacuations.

But this time she watched it from a separate facility across the road, where she works checking labels on parts bins. Irby says Lear Corporation, which operates the factory and is a major Hyundai supplier, moved her to warehouse duty after she started speaking out publicly about health and safety issues at the facility last year.

On Thursday, the United Auto Workers union, which has been running a union drive at the Selma factory, plans to deliver a petition with more than 25,000 signatures to Hyundai dealerships in more than 20 states and the corporate headquarters in Fountain Valley, California, calling on the South Korean company to demand its supplier protect its workers against exposure to unsafe chemicals on the job.

Hyundai said in a statement that "the health and safety of workers associated with the manufacturing of Hyundai vehicles is paramount," and that the company's contracts with suppliers "require them to be in full compliance with all applicable laws and regulations."

The UAW action comes after decades of wage cuts in the auto industry, where much of the manufacturing base has shifted to non-union operations in the South. While manufacturing jobs were once tickets to the middle class, many are now closer to low-wage jobs at McDonald's or Walmart, in both pay and precarity. One in four auto parts workers make less than $12.63 an hour, according to a recent report by the National Employment Law Project, and 600,000 manufacturing workers make $9.60 or less per hour — comparable to workers in fast food and retail.

Low pay isn't the only parallel between fast food and the auto industry: Contracting creates an insulating layer between employees and the big companies. About 14% of auto parts workers are employed by staffing agencies, not the factories they are working in, the NELP report found. Those agencies pay lower wages that are typically not included in official industry-specific wage data. Estimates based on U.S. census data indicate that agency-contracted workers make 30% less, on average, than direct employees.

These multiple layers between factory workers and car companies also mean accountability for health and safety issues often takes place far from the public eye, with little-known second- and third-tier employers held responsible.

"The best thing to do is to get the auto companies on the hook for their violations, since it is technically their business," said Cathy Rucklehaus, a workplace standards enforcement expert with the National Employment Law Project. "You can't have a car without a seat. You could also be responsible for the workers that are providing those products."

Since Hyundai dictates that contracted suppliers make a certain kind of foam seat that requires employees to work with hazardous chemicals, Rucklehaus said, they could potentially be found jointly responsible as an employer for health and safety violations. Historically, auto industry unions would deal with health, safety, wages, and other workplace conditions at plants, she said, so there isn't a lot of precedent for these kinds of legal cases.

"You don't have auto cases very often because unions were there, and workers had pretty good wages," said Rucklehaus.

Don Emmert / Getty Images

Over the past five years, 24 suppliers of Hyundai Motor Company in Montgomery, Alabama, have been cited for health and safety violations. Of the 79 violations, 46 were classified as "serious," meaning they were hazards that could "cause an accident or illness that would most likely result in death or serious physical harm, unless the employer did not know or could not have known of the violation," according to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

In May, OSHA sent a "hazard alert" letter to Lear Corp., calling on the company to take "necessary" steps to protect its Selma workforce from exposure to TDI, or toluene diisocyanate, a chemical used in the production of car parts that has been linked to asthma and cancer.

A Hyundai spokesperson said its supplier agreement with Lear Corp. is technically with Lear's plant in Hope Hull, Alabama, which "would suggest this petition/action/rally/campaign is misdirected." In Hyundai's supply chain, Lear Corp. first makes the cushions and headrests for car seats in Selma, which are then assembled into more finished parts at other Lear Corp. locations.

The letter from OSHA details recurring air contamination at the Selma plant, including an instance where Lear Corp.'s monitors detected TDI levels in the air more than 18 times the federal permissible limit.

OSHA wrote that "reports of workers and management concerning spills, leaks and alarms" strongly suggest "employees are periodically exposed to elevated TDI at the facility," and, further, that OSHA investigators identified employees "who suffered from symptoms and medical conditions consistent with isocyanate-induced asthma."

In a response letter to OSHA dated June 1, Lear Corp. stated no Selma employee has filed a workers' compensation claim or received workers' comp benefits for isocyanate-induced asthma. Lear Corp. also stated that data recorded during OSHA inspections showed "our plant's atmosphere falls within lawful limits" as well as within "limits scientifically recognized as hazardous in the industry."

While recordings taken during visits by OSHA inspectors were within legal limits, the regulator cited readings recorded at other times by Lear Corp.'s own internal monitors. According to the letter, even brief exposure to TDI, below current OSHA limits and industry standards, could lead to asthma and other respiratory conditions. Peter Dooley, a consultant for the National Council for Health and Safety and adviser to OSHA, told BuzzFeed News that if monitoring devices indicate a level of exposure that calls for evacuation, "that is a health and safety disaster right now."

A spokesperson for Lear Corp. told BuzzFeed News that as a precaution, the company evacuates the factory every time a chemical monitor goes off, and that various factors can set off the alarms, including dust, dirt, and malfunction. They said Irby was moved from the factory line to the warehouse "so she would be more comfortable," because she continues to allege that the factory air is unsafe.

While OSHA can and does impose penalties for violations — a total of $284,504 for the 79 listed above, reduced to $156,763 after the companies appealed and provided additional documentation — Dooley says the amounts are not typically enough to incentivize companies to change their practices, and internal monitoring by workers and employers is more effective.

"We know that organized workers have more health and safety oversight," he said. "If an OSHA investigator were to go to every work site, it would take more than a hundred years."

In April, an Alabama federal judge issued a restraining order against Lear Corp. after the Labor Department accused the company of illegally harassing another worker who had spoken out about health and safety and of obstructing a federal OSHA investigation.

Irby said that Lear Corp. has told workers that the OSHA investigation could be bad for business and that the union is acting in self-interest in Selma.

"They say the union will take our money," she said. "They can't take what we don't have."

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American Apparel Founder Claims Hedge Fund Seduced Him, From Machu Picchu To Central Park

In a new round of legal filings, Dov Charney describes Standard General’s lengthy pursuit of a partnership that quickly turned toxic.

Mark Ralston / Getty Images

The wrangling between American Apparel's new management and the company's ousted founder Dov Charney has escalated significantly in the last week, with both sides releasing dramatic and previously unseen allegations against the other.

Via court filings, American Apparel published salacious X-rated text messages allegedly sent by the former CEO to a number of staff members.

And on his side, Charney has submitted a fresh lawsuit offering a much more detailed look into the events surrounding his exile from the company. To support the suit, he has shared previously unseen messages outlining his dealings with hedge fund Standard General, which now controls the business, and new allegations of his interactions with its top executives.

The suit contains an email from Standard General analyst Robert Lavan to Charney on June 22 with a picture of him at an overlook in Machu Picchu. "If I could do this, we can definitely take back APP," the message says, referring to the company with its stock symbol.

An email from Standard General's Robert Lavan to Dov Charney on June 22, 2014.

Court filings / Via court filings

A few days later, Charney accepted a loan from Standard General to boost his stake in the company. His lawsuit alleges that after taking the loan, Standard General managing partner Soo Kim met with Charney in Central Park, panicked, and told him he was getting "crucified" by his limited partner investors for associating with Charney — Kim allegedly said one investor pulled $300 million from the fund in response. The lawsuit says that throughout the meeting, "Kim was scratching himself 'to a bleed' in panic."

Kim, according to the lawsuit, asked Charney to stand down from the board and agree to a short investigation, creating the appearance of independence between the investor and the then-CEO.

"Once I get in, I will control the situation and the outcome and I promise to take care of you," Kim allegedly told Charney during a visit to his apartment. "It will take only two weeks and you will be right back in, three weeks at the worst."

The lawsuit says he repeatedly told Charney to "let me get the tip in."

"This is yet another example of the frivolous, meritless lawsuits that Mr. Charney and his associates continue to file at a breakneck pace," a spokesman for Standard General said in an email. "The facts speak for themselves, and we are confident that he will ultimately be held accountable."

A spokesperson for American Apparel didn't respond to a request for comment.

In the following months, Kim allegedly sent texts to Charney assuring him that he would be reinstated following an investigation into his time as CEO, and saying "you have to respect the kabuki dance," of the investigation, the lawsuit claims. Charney alleges that despite such talk, Kim and his fund were planning to oust him all along, and is seeking damages of $100 million.

Charney says in the lawsuit that when he was first presented with his termination letter in June, he was offered a "positive" press release that would accompany his decision to resign as CEO and work for the company as a paid creative consultant. Board members allegedly told him that if he refused that, he would be fired "for cause" and the board would "destroy his character publicly with false and misleading claims against his personal and professional reputation," the lawsuit says.

The narratives on each side are now very clear.

American Apparel's current management portray Charney as a man who didn't know how to run a serious public company, and are swift to bring up sex: the sex he was allegedly having with models in his office, the sexy photography he allegedly saved on to company servers, and the sexual harassment suits that distracted the company, and the sex-heavy branding that the company is moving away from.

And aside from all that, Charney agreed to the situation he's in now by signing on the dotted line, with Standard General, they argue. He wasn't tricked or coerced into anything, they say.

Charney and those loyal to him say that the Wall Street guys are the ones in the wrong — they took advantage of a naive, unsuspecting entrepreneur who built something from scratch. Through a complicated set of deals they tricked him out of his life's work, putting at risk thousands of garment worker and white collar jobs in the process.

What's more, they say, the new management is using sex to draw attention away from the fact that Charney was the victim of a complex and ruthless set of financial maneuvers. Ultimately, the company's sales and stock price have both taken a dive since Charney's ouster, benefiting few while setting up a small group of interlopers for a big payday, they say. His supporters are quick to point out that Standard General's other most prominent investment is RadioShack — whose fate is well known.

Indeed, it's difficult to discern the truth from the spin. But here's one metric nobody disputes: American Apparel stock closed at 51 cents on Wednesday, down 59% from last July, and down 93% from when the company first went public in 2006.

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For-Profit Charter Operator In Jeb Bush Video Has A Checkered Past

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In Jeb Bush's first set of campaign videos, including one released yesterday, there is no place more prominently featured than the classroom. Oft-repeated reels of footage show Bush, known as Florida's "education governor," speaking to rooms full of hand-waving elementary students, leaning over a girl's shoulder as she works on the computer, and sitting down for a discussion with smiling boys in ties.

Many of those students wear the uniforms of Mater Academy of International Studies; others are students at Somerset Academy South Miami, where Jeb Bush's campaign was seen filming earlier this month, according to Politico. Almost all of the classrooms have something in common: they are at schools operated by Academica, the state's largest for-profit charter school management company.

Academica, which has almost 100 schools in Florida and well over $150 million in annual revenue, has a checkered past. Along with an ongoing federal probe into its real estate dealings, past investigations have looked at allegedly corrupt connections with lawmakers. Last year, controversy erupted over its opening of an unaccredited college funded by one of its charter schools.

Of his time as governor of Florida, Bush told Fox News in the wake of his presidential campaign announcement that "what I'm most proud of is reforming our education system."

As suggested by Bush's latest ads, Academica and its high-performing charter schools, which consistently receive high grades from the state, are perhaps the best examples of that legacy at work. The company owes much of its growth in Florida to Bush's policies during his governorship. Bush spurred charter schools to flourish in the state, including those operated by for-profit companies, which found a way to circumvent a 1996 law that forbids the practice. To get around the law, companies set up nonprofit boards to run the schools, which then contract out virtually all of the work to for-profit operators. Bush has been a supporter of for-profit operators. In emails, he suggested that his successor, Rick Scott, sell the massive state-run Florida Virtual School to a for-profit operator, where it could make "more [money]in the private sector."

As governor, Bush visited Academica schools several times, his emails show, including a trip to a campus of a Mater Academy school in 2006. His son, Jeb Bush Jr., was elected to serve as the chair of the nonprofit board another Academica school group, Somerset Academy, though he later withdrew his name.

A Miami Herald investigation in 2011 found Academica was embroiled in a complex and controversial real estate scheme. Its founder and president, Fernando Zulueta, owns a wide swath of real estate companies — firms that also lease tax-exempt space to many of Academica's schools, acting as their landlords. Academica schools pay tens of thousands of dollars in rent, sometimes over 20% of their revenue, well above the area average, to Zulueta-connected real estate holdings, the Herald found, deals that are meted out by nonprofit governing boards with close ties to Academica.

In 2003, for example, Mater Academy, whose logos dot the polo shirts of students in Bush's campaign ad, signed a $5.8 million construction contract to a company whose contractor also served on the school's board. And Mater Academy High leased its land from a company owned in part by Zulueta's brother, the Herald reported.

Similar real estate setups have landed other charter companies in serious federal trouble. One other major operator, Imagine Schools, was ordered to pay $1 million in January for a "self-dealing" real estate scheme.

Mater Academy was the focus of a federal investigation last year, the Herald reported. Academica's founder and his family, a preliminary report found, had ties that constituted "a potential conflict of interest" to the companies that Mater Academy leased its space from, and to an architect that designed their buildings.

A new controversy arose last year, when the company opened Doral Academy, a junior college within one of its schools in suburban Miami. The school is funded with taxpayer dollars intended for the state's K-12 system. The school is entirely unaccredited, meaning its credits do not transfer to any other schools, which prompted skepticism from officials and outside observers. The college is helmed by Anitere Flores, a state senator and former education adviser to Bush.

Flores has also been involved in education-related legislative efforts in Florida — and was the sponsor of a bill to create virtual charter schools in the state, The Herald reported; when it passed, Academica applied to open 19 such schools.

Other Florida legislators with close ties to Academica, and to Bush, have also been behind legislation that works in favor of the company. State representative Erik Fresen, who is married to an Academica executive who also happens to be the CEO's sister, relaxed zoning restrictions that stood in the way of Academica's expansion.

Working with the company can be lucrative. Miami-Dade prosecutors investigated another former representative, Ralph Arza, after he backed a slew of pro-charter bills while serving as a consultant on the payroll of Academica. He was paid $230,000 for his services, via a company set up in his wife's name. He was later cleared. The Tampa Bay Times said Arza, a Republican, "worked with Bush on many of his education initiatives."

The Jeb Bush campaign and Academica did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

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Regulator Publishes Thousands Of Consumer Complaints Against Banks

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has released a database of over 7,000 “narratives” of complaints made by consumers against banks and other financial companies.

CFPB

In the face of protest from the industry, a database of consumer complaints against banking and financial services companies has been published by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The database includes over 7,000 detailed complaints, written by consumers.

This is not the first time the CFPB, which has attracted legions of young and tech-savvy employees since its establishment in 2011, has launched an easy-to-use (by federal government standards) database of consumer complaints.

A separate database published by the CFPB already includes records of over 600,000 anonymized individual complaints received by the regulator, although it is light on detail. The new complaints take the form of "narratives" written by consumers, offering more specifics on what allegedly took place in each incident.

In a recent speech, Richard Cordray, the head of the CFPB, said the existing complaint collection has allowed the bureau to help people "secure millions of dollars in monetary relief and further satisfaction in the form of non-monetary relief, such as cleaning up their credit reports or fending off errant or harassing debt collectors, which can have ripple effects on people's financial well-being as well as their peace of mind."

After the CFPB proposed to make the narrative complaints public, it faced a strong and immediate backlash from the financial services industry.

"Publishing narratives of every unverified complaint will give only the illusion of disclosure," the head of the Consumer Bankers Association, Richard Hunt, said in a statement last year when the policy was first proposed. "This action will ultimately add to consumer confusion, harm industry reputations, and undermine any hope the CFPB may have to be viewed as a fair and honest broker."

The complaints do not look good for the financial institutions and offer a view into how consumers — at least those who complain — can feel confused and victimized by their interactions with banks and other financial companies. Companies can submit a response that will be included in the database.

As a regulator still in its infancy — it was founded in 2011 — the CFPB has often come under fire from lawmakers and industry, while also needing to build up awareness of its existence among the general public.

Publication of complaints is one avenue to increase public awareness, and the bureau even made a video of one complaint with the aim of spreading the message further. In the video, which it shared with BuzzFeed News, a doctor named Navid talks about a mortgage company asking for a $12,000 contingency fee when he tried to buy a home.

The loan was turned down "a few days prior to closing," and Navid says he lost the $12,000 and hadn't been able to get in touch with the lender despite many calls and emails. He then submitted a complaint to the CFPB after seeing a Daily Show appearance by Cordray, its director.

A few days later, he received an apology letter and a $12,000 check from the mortgage company, along with reimbursement for an inspection and appraisal. "This is why I chose this country, this is why this country is the best place to live on earth," Navid said after his experience with the bureau.

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One complaint included in the database covers a customer's dispute over a checking account. The customer, who lives in California, says that she had her identity stolen and yet was still "harassed" by collection agencies over what the bank said she owed.

"If they use a little common sense, that would be the first indication that it is a fraudulent account or at least give me a chance to hear me out and take my complaint seriously," the customer said. "It has been extremely frustrating since they seem extremely unprofessional in the way they are going about this issue."

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Feds Probe Debt Collector Targeting Student Lenders

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is investigating claims that a debt collector targeting private student loans may be involved in questionable lawsuits against borrowers.

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Cordray.

Steve Helber / AP Photo

A federal probe into potentially illegal practices by student loan debt collectors could provide relief to thousands of Americans struggling to pay off costly college debt.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is investigating whether some collection agencies are involved in lawsuits against student loan borrowers even when the companies can't prove their legal right to collect on the loans, according to agency documents and people familiar with the investigation. The CFPB is weighing "whether Bureau action is warranted" against the collectors, documents say.

If investigators can prove wrongdoing, thousands of low-income borrowers could be spared years of wage garnishment that would place them at greater risk for financial hardship, including bankruptcy.

The lawsuits mirror illegal practices by mortgage companies seeking to foreclose after the 2008 financial crisis. Banks have paid billions to settle charges related to "robo-signing" — the practice of swearing falsely that a person has direct knowledge about a loan and the chain of companies that owned it. The people claiming to have that knowledge turned out to be signing hundreds of affidavits a day, often without reviewing the underlying loan files.

The investigation is another reminder of the troubling, and sometimes illegal, practices targeting student borrowers. The Education Department recently cut ties with five collection agencies it said were providing inaccurate information to borrowers, and scammers are aggressively targeting student lenders with phony debt forgiveness schemes, just as they did with distressed mortgage holders during the collapse of the housing bubble.

These kinds of issues are an unfortunate byproduct of America's $1.2 trillion pile of student debt turning sour. Federal Reserve data shows 11.3% of student loans were more than 90 days delinquent at the end of 2014, more than triple the rate for mortgages, making student debtors a prime target for questionable collection schemes.

Federal Reserve Bank of New York

Student debt lawsuits have flooded into state courts across the country over the past three years, consumer lawyers say. They say the cases typically hinge on affidavits signed by the same handful of people, all swearing to have personal knowledge of loans made years earlier by companies that they never worked for. The signatures belong to employees of Transworld Systems Inc., a private debt-collection company.

Transworld was hired on behalf of investors who own hundreds of thousands of private student loans worth billions of dollars. The loans were originated by all kinds of lenders, including major players such as Bank of America and JPMorgan Chase & Co. Transworld's lawsuits aim to collect on loans that were issued by these banks and then bundled into trusts and sold off to investors. The loans have passed through so many hands that it is often difficult for Transworld to document its clients' rights to collect on them, consumer attorneys say.

"They aren't able to produce the documents that are necessary" to identify the owner of the note, or to produce a witness who can testify about the history of the loan at trial, said Nancy Thompson, a consumer attorney in Des Moines, Iowa who has handled 10 such cases.

Nevertheless, many courts "are becoming rubber stamps for lawsuits — not making sure [debt collectors] have the right to collect" before entering judgments in favor of lenders, according to Robyn Smith, an attorney who has studied the issue and works with the National Consumer Law Center, a nonprofit consumer advocacy group.

Transworld officials did not respond to emailed requests for comment. An employee reached by phone said that "Transworld is a private company and does not grant interviews."

The CFPB in January issued subpoenas to Transworld employees, demanding interviews with them. Transworld's attorneys intercepted at least one of the subpoenas and later asked to be present at the private interview of an employee whose name appears on dozens of affidavits, according to agency documents. CFPB director Richard Cordray denied that request, according to a document posted on the agency's website Tuesday.

In 2013, Transworld and several affiliates paid $3.2 million to settle charges filed by the Federal Trade Commission that they had harassed consumers by calling them multiple times a day and calling them at their workplaces, among other illegal tactics. The companies did not admit to any wrongdoing.

A spokesperson for the bureau declined to comment because the agency cannot discuss ongoing enforcement probes.

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Palantir Valued At $20 Billion In New Funding Round

The secretive data-processing company is raising up to $500 million in a previously undisclosed round of funding. The round makes it the third most valuable startup in the United States.

Palantir CEO Alex Karp.

Nati Harnik / AP

By managing data for government agencies and Wall Street banks, Palantir Technologies has grown into one of the most valuable venture-backed companies in Silicon Valley. Now it is adding billions to its already rich valuation.

Palantir is raising up to $500 million in new capital at a valuation of $20 billion, people briefed on the matter told BuzzFeed News, insisting on anonymity to discuss the confidential deal. The 11-year-old company previously raised money late last year at a $15 billion valuation.

The new round of funding, which has not been previously disclosed, reflects investors' eagerness to gain access to a startup seen as one of the most successful in the world. Little is known about the details of Palantir's business, beyond reports about its data-processing software being used to fight terror and catch financial criminals.

But the secrecy apparently didn't bother investors, who are said to have been impressed by Palantir's growth in the first quarter of this year. One person close to the company said it had more than $1 billion of cash in the bank.

Beyond its high-level connections in government, Palantir is also tied to some of the most powerful figures in Silicon Valley. Its co-founders include Peter Thiel, the prominent venture capitalist, and Joe Lonsdale, who is now a partner at the venture capital firm Formation 8. Among its earliest investors was In-Q-Tel, the venture capital arm of the C.I.A.

With a $20 billion valuation, Palantir is estimated to be the third most valuable startup in the United States. Its worth is surpassed only by Uber, which is said to have a $50 billion valuation, and by Airbnb, which was recently reported by the Wall Street Journal to be raising money at a $24 billion valuation.

Palantir, led by CEO Alex Karp, has been able to attract powerful customers in a number of sectors, including finance, energy, healthcare and government. According to a New York Times report last year, the company has helped JPMorgan Chase identify fraud and even helped Hershey make more money from its chocolate.

Like much about the company, the latest funding round is a closely guarded secret. A spokesperson for Palantir declined to comment.

A Big Victory For Attempts To Regulate For-Profit Colleges

President Barack Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan.

Alex Wong / Getty Images

The Obama administration won a major victory Tuesday in its attempts to regulate the for-profit college industry, with a federal judge dismissing an industry lawsuit that threatened to stop the regulations in their tracks.

The judge's ruling over the so-called "gainful employment" regulations mean the rules will likely go into effect on July 1. The regulations punish programs at for-profit colleges that graduate students with high levels of debt but low earnings. Such programs can lose their access to federal financial aid, the lifeblood of for-profit schools.

The Obama administration has long sought to regulate the industry, which critics say too often mires students in debt but fails to provide them with a valued education, all while raking in billions of dollars in taxpayer money in the form of federal financial aid.

“Today’s decision is a win for America’s students and taxpayers," said Education Secretary Arne Duncan in a statement. "Far too often, so-called career colleges leave students burdened with debt they’ll never be able to repay and stick taxpayers with the bill."

The dismissal was a blow to the embattled industry, whose lobbying group, the Association of Private Sector Colleges and Universities, had thwarted the Obama administration's previous regulatory efforts once before, in 2012. After that victory, which essentially tossed out the rules on a technicality, the administration was forced to return to the drawing board, rewriting the rules to cut out a metric that measured a student loan default rates.

The judge's ruling today said that the administration had the statutory authority to regulate the industry, and that the regulations themselves were not improperly designed.

The regulations still face a threat in Congress, where several House Republicans have attempted several times — unsuccessfully — to defund the rules.

A spokesperson for the industry lobbying group said in a statement that it was "disappointed by today’s decision," and would be reviewing its options. "The primary impact of the regulation will be to deprive hundreds of thousands of students of access to higher education," the statement said. "That is inconsistent with the congressional plan under the Higher Education Act, unlawful, and bad policy.”

American Apparel Reveals Raunchy Alleged Messages Between Ex-CEO And Staff

In a court filing, American Apparel’s chair provided explicit details allegedly uncovered during an investigation into the company’s ousted founder.

Reuters Staff / Reuters

American Apparel has submitted a trove of serious and often lurid allegations against ex-CEO and founder Dov Charney, in response to a defamation lawsuit Charney brought against the company and its chair last month.

In a lengthy declaration filed late last week, Colleen Brown, who chairs American Apparel's board and is a member of the "Suitability Committee" that investigated and eventually fired Charney last year, alleged the ex-CEO used company devices to send sexually explicit texts and emails to employees.

"Daddy is so excited to play with the most little tiny blonde cum kitten in the whole school," one message allegedly read. Another: "Should I unload my cock now??? Like a filthy pig?"

The filing is the most detailed insight American Apparel has given into its investigation into Charney, which began after he was served with a surprise termination letter in June. The inclusion of such such explicit messages, and allegations of sexual antics taking place between Charney and American Apparel's models and employees, is another escalation of the long-running war of words between the ousted founder and the company's new management.

Excerpt from declaration by American Apparel chairperson Colleen Brown (contains graphic language):

Court filings / Via CourtLink

Brown alleged Charney "frequently engaged in inappropriate sexual banter, infantilizing women and referring to himself as 'Daddy,'" and that he verbally and physically abused employees. Brown also shared details about previously confidential arbitration settlements with ex-employees as part of the filing.

Brown's statements, which are dated Sept. 30, were filed Friday as part of American Apparel's response to a defamation lawsuit filed by Charney in May as part of a broader effort by the founder and his allies to win back control of the company.

American Apparel filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit under a California statute that defends people sued for exercising their right to free speech and petition. As part of that, the company is looking to prove that internal statements it made about Charney and his termination are accurate and made without malice — hence the sharing of all those graphic details.

Keith Fink, a lawyer for Charney, said "much of this information and allegations are completely false." The information shows management "desperately trying to distort public attention to the fact that Mr. Charney's firing was illegal, that his rights as a shareholder of the company were disenfranchised and that the Standard General and their appointed management team are losing control of the business from a financial point of view," he said, referring to the hedge fund that now controls the company.

Brown alleged Charney used an American Apparel computer and network server to save videos and images of himself "engaged in all manner of sexual behavior with numerous models and employees." She cites videos and images "of a model orally copulating Mr. Charney's penis, testicles and anus during a photo shoot" and "images and video of another model engaging in mutual masturbation with Mr. Charney and orally copulating his penis."

"At least one of these encounters appears, based on the pictures and videos, to have taken place in Mr. Charney's office," her declaration said.

Charney allegedly sought to remove evidence of the encounters, Brown said, by sending emails to employees asking them to "delete naughty emails!"

In accusing Charney of physically and verbally abusing staff, Brown cites an email from a woman employee that allegedly said: "First, don't ever, ever hit or slap me in the face again. Don't call me a slut, whore, slave or bitch. Don't call me stupid."

The unnamed woman allegedly went on to say: "[T]o be associated with American Apparel, especially as a woman, was once a bit of a status symbol — something to be proud of. Now it means you're a whore.'"

In past interviews, Charney has acknowledged having physical relationships with staff members, but stressed that all were consensual.

American Apparel recently obtained a temporary restraining order against Charney that prevents him from disparaging the company. But that hasn't stopped him from pursuing legal action against the company, most recently by way of a separate defamation suit filed on Friday.

The new filing by American Apparel also sheds light on high-profile sexual harassment claims against Charney that were ultimately settled in confidential arbitration. Claims from ex-employees named Kimbra Lo and Tesa Lubans-DeHaven were settled before arbitration hearings for confidential amounts, Brown said in last week's filing.

The famous Irene Morales sexual harassment lawsuit, in which Morales sought $260 million and alleged Charney locked her in his apartment as a "sex slave," was settled for $1.56 million based on a finding that Charney supported another employee setting up a blog that impersonated her. And Alyssa Ferguson, another ex-employee, was awarded $1.82 million based on Charney's failure to intervene in the creation of another blog that impersonated her.

Brown claims that in total, such lawsuits against Charney cost $8.2 million in insured litigation costs and $1.2 million in uninsured litigation costs through September 2014.

"If these events happened, why was he given an employment agreement in 2012?" said Keith Fink, Charney's lawyer, in an email. "The answer is simple: these events either didn't happen, were irrelevant (e.g. such as the blog which the company approved based on the First Amendment) or were of a personal nature (such as an amorous message only discovered when the company broke into Mr. Charney's e-mail or text messages)."

American Apparel closed at a record low of 41 cents a share yesterday, down 66% from a high point in July 2014, in the wake of Charney's initial termination.

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Fewer Guests And Higher Checks Get Olive Garden Back On Track

Olive Garden is kicking the habit of luring customers by offering big discounts. But don’t worry, never-ending pasta isn’t going anywhere.

Jeffery Patrick / Via Darden

Olive Garden is beginning to turn things around after a long losing streak, and it's not thanks to more diners walking through the doors.

Same restaurant sales at the Italian chain have been positive for 10 consecutive months, owner Darden reported on Tuesday. And the restaurant's comparable sales for the 2015 fiscal year were up 1.3%, the first time the annual figure has been positive since the 2011 fiscal year.

Darden expects traffic to Olive Garden restaurants to be flat in fiscal 2016, CEO Gene Lee told investors on an earnings call. But comparable sales are expected to grow between 1.5% and 2.5% as the chain continues to offer fewer promotions.

Olive Garden is trying to kick the habit of offering discount deals, and paying high marketing costs to promote them. Not only are the restaurants offering fewer promos, but "we're seeing growth in alcoholic beverage sales and add-ons like appetizers and desserts," a spokesperson told BuzzFeed News in an email.

But Olive Garden isn't getting rid of all of its value-for-money items. "Never-ending pasta bowl is not going away," Lee promised on the call. Its $9.99 Cucina Mia menu has also been popular, and fortunately for the chain, half of customers who order from this value menu buy an add-on as well, increasing the check.

Darden is also increasing its focus on developing Olive Garden's take out business, which it expects will eventually reach 26% of sales. "To-go is only going to get more and more important to the consumer," said Lee. Also, the chain is seeing a sales bump at its remodeled stores.

Strategy aside, perhaps the biggest aid to Olive Garden is that customers are starting to spend more money as the economy improves. "The consumer is looking for less discounting activity today than they were a year ago or two years ago," Lee said. "The environment is helping us."

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14 Brands Of Bottled Water Have Been Recalled For E. Coli Risk

Niagara Bottling is recalling 14 brands of water after fining E. coli contamination at one of its springs.

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Only water made at the Hamburg, Pennsylvania and Allentown, Pennsylvania facilities from June 10 to June 18 are affected.

Niagara

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8 Things We Learned About Planet Fitness From Its IPO Filing

The shares will trade on the New York Stock Exchange as “PLNT.”

Planet Fitness / Via sec.gov

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Government Asks Search Engines To Crack Down On Student Debt Scammers

Search engines like Google, Bing and Yahoo have been asked by a federal regulator to crack down on the rising number of scammers that target student loan debtors via search advertising.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau today released letters encouraging major search engines to work with state governments to curb such scams, asking them to "ensure your search products are not being used by individuals and companies seeking to prey on the most vulnerable student loan borrowers."

Borrowers who are struggling to repay their student loans turn to search engines with simple phrases like "student loan relief" and "student debt forgiveness," the CFPB letter said. Advertising shown on the results pages often direct struggling borrowers to potentially illegal schemes.

A Google search Monday for "student loan forgiveness" yielded advertisements for websites that were charging more than $500 in upfront fees to file paperwork, that guaranteed callers loans would be forgiven, and one site that said it had "a direct connection to the Education Department."

The top results on major search engines — shown above links from the Education Department — often advertise sites that charge huge upfront fees to file paperwork, falsely imply a connection to the federal government, and make false promises about loan forgiveness. Most sites simply file a few pages of paperwork on behalf of borrowers to enroll them in income-based repayment plans, which do not involve any kind of loan forgiveness. That paperwork is simple, free and intended to be filled out by borrowers themselves.

"This bears a close resemblance to the foreclosure crisis," the CFPB letter said, when Google worked with the Inspector General's office to shut down mortgage scam websites that had advertised with the search engine.

The Squeezable Mayonnaise Crisis Is Almost Over

Hellmann’s says the amount of inaccessible mayo trapped in empty squeeze bottles was “very serious problem in America.” But those dark days are almost over.

Hellmann's

One of the things stressing out the maker of Hellmann's mayonnaise was the faulty design of its squeeze bottle. That, and declining sales in the U.S.

If you eat mayo, you've likely confronted the minor frustration of not being able to get those last few dollops clinging to the bottle walls and out of reach at the bottom. The company calls this "a very serious problem in America right now," which sounds hyperbolic, even if Hellmann's went through the trouble to calculate that 1,000 pounds of its mayo were trapped in squeeze bottles last year, which is enough to make 32,000 turkey club sandwiches.

So Hellmann's recently launched a redesigned squeeze bottle for its mayonnaise that promises to reduce mayo waste by 60% compared to its previous bottle.

BuzzFeed / Via buzzfeed.com

The redesigned squeeze bottle is part of efforts to reverse a recent slide in sales. Hellmann's mayo sales in the U.S. were down about 4.5 percent last year compared to 2012, according to data from research firm Euromonitor International.

The secret to the new bottle design is "a proprietary technology that uses a micro layer of just enough vegetable oil... to allow it to easily slide out of the bottle," the company said.

The bottle was remolded by packaging company Sidel "to eliminate any deep curves or grooves that could interrupt the flow of the mayonnaise or create pockets where it could get stuck" and the cap was updated by Ermo "to a silicone valve dispensing system" that apparently makes it easier to control the mayo flow.

"The number one complaint about our old bottles was that mayonnaise would stick to the inside," a spokesperson wrote in an email. "We're committed to continuing to provide quality products and positive experiences that keeps people coming back."

For those who don't like the squeeze, all Hellmann's will continue to offer its mayo in jars.

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Twitter Lays E-Commerce Groundwork With New Product Pages

Brands and stars set up shops within Twitter.

We spend a lot of time within the walls of social media companies. So much, in fact, that some are now ingesting other parts of the internet to spare you the inconvenience of going outside. Some want to bring you the daily news (see: Facebook's Instant Articles). Others want to take you shopping (see: Pinterest "buy" button). Today, Twitter introduced new product pages that lay groundwork for a full shopping experience to exist within its walls.

In a blog post describing the effort, Twitter said it was "beginning to test new ways for people and brands to create and share Twitter collections of products and places." Target, Nike, Disney, and a handful of other brands released product pages on Twitter today. The pages look and feel like normal online shops. There's a hitch with these, however. In nearly every case, Twitter's product pages send you outside of Twitter to complete the purchase.

Interestingly, the pages aren't limited to brand name retailers. Stars like Reese Witherspoon, William Shatner, and Michelle Phan built product pages as well, looking to turn their outsize followings into retail dollars. Social gives these stars a new, direct route to access their fans, and they are now competing with retailers in a way that would be unimaginable just a few years ago.

This isn't Twitter's first foray into retail. The company has been piloting a "buy" button that allows you to purchase items without leaving the platform. The button's performance isn't booming yet, but it's still early. The natural next step for Twitter would be integrate that button into all of these pages. (Threadless, one participating retailer, already has it.)

Twitter declined our request for an interview. But its blog post promised that "this is just the beginning."

As Mobile Unit Struggles, Former Nokia Chief Stephen Elop Leaves Microsoft

Press guru Mark Penn is also heading for the exit.

Mark Lennihan / AP

When Microsoft announced it was acquiring Nokia's handset business for over $7 billion in late 2013, many speculated that Nokia's then-chief, Stephen Elop — a Microsoft alumnus — could one day succeed CEO Steve Ballmer.

Satya Nadella got the top job instead, and Elop still ended up running Microsoft's device group, overseeing the company's smartphone, tablet, and Xbox gaming console businesses. But his time at the company is coming to an end: Microsoft announced today that Elop would leave the company as part of an executive reshuffle.

Elop's role will be taken over by Terry Myerson, current head of the company's Windows division, who will now lead a new combined Windows and Devices group.

"Stephen and I have agreed that now is the right time for him to retire from Microsoft," Nadella said in an email to employees. "I regret the loss of leadership that this represents, and look forward to seeing where his next destination will be."

Since the Nokia acquisition, Microsoft's cell phone business and adoption of its Windows phone operating system has continued to lag Apple and Google, posing a major threat to the company's position in an increasingly mobile-driven tech landscape.

"This new team brings together all the engineering capability required to drive breakthrough innovations that will propel the Windows ecosystem forward," Nadella said. The unit will include Windows as well as Microsoft devices including the Surface tablet, Lumia smartphones, Xbox consoles, and new experiments like the Hololens augmented reality headset and Band fitness tracker.

The absorption of Microsoft's device business into its operating systems group follows the announcement last year that the software giant would lay off 18,000 employees, mainly from the former Nokia business, including over 1,000 layoffs in Nokia's native Finland.

Another high-profile executive leaving Microsoft is Mark Penn, the former adviser to Bill and Hillary Clinton who helped run Microsoft's communications and public relations team. Penn's time at the company included its infamous "Scroogled" TV campaign that accused Google, in the style of political campaign ads, of violating its users' privacy.

Nadella said in the email that Penn had told him "a number of months ago" about his plan to leave Microsoft. "Mark has helped me set the company on a new course. I'm thankful for the wise strategic counsel Mark has provided, and I look forward to seeing what he does next," Nadella said in the email.

Two other executives, Kiril Tatarinov and Eric Rudder, will also leave the company.

Baltimore's Challenge: Buy Computers For 100,000 Kids, And Don't Mess It Up

The Los Angeles school district’s attempt to give all its students an iPad was a billion-dollar disaster. Baltimore County and its ambitious young superintendent hope to succeed where L.A. failed.

Baltimore County Superintendent Dallas Dance with students using the county's new devices.

Baltimore County Public Schools

As the Baltimore school system goes all-in on an ambitious plan to equip every student with a tablet computer, it's tough not to see the ghosts of the Los Angeles Unified School District's $1 billion iPad disaster looming over the project.

In L.A., everything that could have gone wrong with the program did. Teachers' unions opposed it almost from the beginning, and were reluctant or unable to integrate the devices into their classrooms. The expensive software was unfinished and rarely used, and the district's infrastructure was ill-equipped to handle the influx of gadgets. Leaked emails hinted at corruption on behalf of district officials. The whole thing eventually collapsed, leaving behind a contentious fight for refunds from Apple and education giant Pearson, and investigations by the FBI and SEC into the entire process.

While the L.A. disaster was a setback for digitizing America's classrooms, it has given school chiefs across the county a practical lesson in the pitfalls of a technology rollout. It led many districts, like the massive Miami Dade district, to pause and rethink their own initiatives, scaling them back or taking a closer look at how the devices would be used.

Baltimore County Public Schools are forging ahead with their own tablet program, which will be one of the country's largest. But consider superintendent S. Dallas Dance's apparent blueprint for the rollout: Look at everything that L.A. did, and then do the opposite.

Baltimore County Public Schools

LA's specter aside, there have been other successful digital rollouts in other districts. Dallas Dance is a protegé of Mark Edwards, the superintendent who oversaw one of the country's most-acclaimed digital initiatives in North Carolina's Mooresville Graded School District, which bought a MacBook for every one of its students. The New York Times called it a "laptop success story."

But that involved just 4,400 students in grades four through twelve. What Dance wants to do is much bigger and more expensive — and much riskier.

Dance was just 30 years old when he was brought in from Houston in 2012 to run the Baltimore County Schools, the country's 18th-largest school system: A $1.6 billion budget, more than 100 schools, 17,000 employees, and 100,000 students, half of whom are from low-income families and more than half of whom are students of color. (Baltimore County's school district is made up of the suburbs and outlying towns of Baltimore; the city of Baltimore has its own, separate, school system.)

Dance's office, in the leafy suburb of Towson, Maryland, sits in a beautiful old brick building on a hill. Dance, handsome and broad shouldered, strides in and out of almost-constant meetings, talks fast, and rarely goes off script.

"We asked ourselves, what's our purpose of our school system?" Dance said, seconds after sitting down for an interview. "We want to prepare students to be globally competitive, and for that, we need a digital learning environment. We need to level the playing field so that everyone gets access, regardless of school, regardless of community."

As the district's youngest-ever superintendent, Dance immediately attracted controversy in Baltimore County, where teachers and residents balked at his youth and lack of experience. He needed to get a special waiver to take the job, lacking the minimum of three years' teaching experience required by the district.

Once in place, Dance moved fast, ordering a rewrite of curriculum to align with Common Core standards, closing some schools and opening others, and overhauling student schedules. Just a year into the job, he set out to put a tablet into the hands of every one of Baltimore County's 100,000 students. The $205 million "one-to-one" initiative was approved in March of 2014; by September, the first devices were in classrooms.

By the time Baltimore's initiative was approved, L.A.'s much-touted $1 billion iPad initiative had already begun to unravel, taking with it the reputation of the district's superintendent, John Deasy. Less than a year old, the program had been plagued by reports that teachers had received almost no training, that the pricey Pearson curriculum preloaded on the iPads was unfinished and rarely used, and that within days, high school students had figured out how to break through the device's security features.

Months later, the initiative collapsed entirely in the wake of emails released by the L.A. Times suggesting Deasy had improperly favored Apple and Pearson executives during the initiative's bidding process. The FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission both launched investigations, and the program was quickly suspended, then dropped.

Weeks later, a report by an outside firm found teachers had barely used the iPads or the curriculum — just one teacher out of 245 was using Pearson's software, and just 30 were using the devices to teach English or math.

In Baltimore County, Dance vows, things will be different.

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Silicon Valley Needs Three World Trade Centers Worth Of New Office Space This Year

The two tallest buildings in the United States wouldn’t be enough to contain Bay Area startups’ expected growth over the next six months.

Justin Sullivan / Getty Images

Silicon Valley startups need space. A lot of space.

As they rapidly hire workers, fueled by a flood of venture capital, startups in California's Bay Area will need about 8.6 million square feet of office space in the next six months, according to a projection by the research firm Mattermark.

To put that number in perspective, picture the two tallest buildings in the United States — One World Trade Center in New York and the Willis Tower in Chicago. Combined, the total rentable space in those buildings is about 6.8 million square feet.

Which wouldn't be enough to satisfy what Silicon Valley needs in the next six months.

Don Emmert / Getty Images

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T-Mobile Workers Rack Up A Small Win, With German Backing

In partnership with the German union representing staff at Deutsche Telekom, T-Mobile’s parent company, call center workers are getting results.

Joe Raedle / Getty Images

T-Mobile has changed a disciplinary policy that could punish call center staff for requesting time off when sick or caring for family members, after pressure from workers and labor activists.

A T-Mobile Vice President announced the policy changes via an internal email last week, saying the company was "resolving another employee pain-point."

The change comes after months of pressure from workers and union activists in America and Germany to improve conditions at T-Mobile. Their united front is the result of a rare partnership between the Communications Workers of America and ver.di, a powerful German union representing workers at Deutsche Telekom, T-Mobile's parent company.

"We've had several small victories like this now" said Hae-lin Choi, an organizer with CWA who previously lived in Germany and worked at ver.di. "We've put together a calendar with the Germans to compare work conditions: wages, monitoring, all that kind of stuff."

A company spokesperson declined to go into specifics about the policy change. "We're proud to have an active dialogue directly with our employees," T-Mobile said in a statement, "just as we do with our customers. We are recognized year after year as a 'Best Place to Work' by industry experts, and provide generous pay and benefits."

Sean Gallup / Getty Images

Under the former scheduling policy, workers could receive demerits known as "today" codes for requesting time off at the last minute, according to T-Mobile workers. Such requests are often made by staff who are sick, or need to look after a child or family member who is.

The company allotted a maximum number of pre-approved time-off hours per day (known as PRETO hours), which were allocated on a first-come first-serve basis. If you were the second or third person to call in requesting time off that day, you might receive a 'today' code because the hours were already taken, workers said.

"The hard thing about these policies is that there aren't clear consequences to how they work," said Ashley Charzuk, a T-Mobile worker and member of TU, the CWA-affiliated union there. "You could have someone with one or two 'today' codes who would be written up. Others would have ten."

The codes triggered a three-step penalty process, according to Charzuk. First, a worker would have a "documented meeting" with a manager. More "today" codes would lead to a "decision day," where the worker would be given a day off, with their company badge deactivated, to write a letter to T-Mobile explaining what they'd done wrong and why they want to work there.

"They tell you you need to take the day off to think about whether or not you want your job," said Charzuk. "If you do want your job, they call you to come in, and you have to write a letter explaining whatever it is you'll do to keep it."

Charzuk wrote just such a letter, explaining that the next time her young daughter got sick she would find a family member to take care of her instead of asking for time off.

More than a few "today" codes could also affect monthly schedules, workers said. A low rank meant you would be more likely to receive worse hours, which in turn could lead to more difficulty arranging childcare.

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WeWork Threatened To Fire Cleaners If They Unionize, Workers Claim

The complaint to the National Labor Relations Board followed a protest at the company’s HQ on Thursday.

32BJ SEIU / Via Facebook: 32BJSEIU

WeWork allegedly threatened to fire cleaners at its New York locations if they unionized, according to an unfair labor practice charge filed to the National Labor Relations Board on Thursday evening.

A local branch of the Service Employees International Union filed the charge on behalf of over 100 contracted cleaners who have been part of an organizing campaign to raise wages and improve benefits at the company, which provides shared office spaces.

WeWork did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Most janitorial workers in New York City office buildings are unionized, paid wages that begin at $18 an hour and go up to $23 an hour, and are provided with health and retirement benefits. But WeWork gets its cleaning staff through a non-union contractor, which pays about $11 an hour, workers say.

Yesterday, WeWork cleaners and their supporters demonstrated outside the company's headquarters, asking to be paid the same as their unionized counterparts.

WeWork has emerged as one of the most valuable startups in the country, valued at $5 billion in a funding round last December. The company runs 15 office buildings in New York, 3 in San Francisco, and dozens more across the country.

LINK: WeWork Cleaners Push For A Raise: “We Work Here Too”

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Discounting At J.Crew Is Making Some Items Cheaper Than Its Outlet

J.Crew, Banana Republic, and Gap are all holding massive sales right now after fashion missteps. Now you can compare those prices to their factory merchandise, which is also available online.

Gene J. Puskar / AP

J.Crew, Banana Republic, and other retailers that had a rough start to the year are offering big discounts this month on full-price and sale items, in an effort to clear through a glut of unsold clothes that failed to resonate with many of their core customers.

Some of those discounts, it turns out, are so steep that they're selling regular clothes cheaper than similar items in their outlets — which are designed to be the lower-cost version of the brand. And thanks to the introduction of separate "factory" websites, consumers can now examine this strange pricing conundrum side by side.

This T-shirt, with the sale at J.Crew's regular website, cost just $11.99 this week.

J.Crew / Via jcrew.com

This J.Crew Factory shirt, which looks virtually identical to the one above but is made in Cambodia, cost $14.50 as of Wednesday.

Via factory.jcrew.com

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