Target workers take note as REI boycott shows labor tensions persist

REI can point to better numbers, but its labor conflict is still spilling into the open. The co-op said 2025 net sales reached $3.54 billion, net income improved by $102 million and the full-year net loss narrowed to $54.3 million, even as store workers escalated a boycott over the company’s Anniversary Sale.

That contrast is exactly why retail workers elsewhere should pay attention. REI said it invested more than $300 million in members, employees and communities in 2025, including $121.9 million in employee incentives and profit sharing, up 44% from 2024. It also added one million new members, bringing membership to more than 26 million. On paper, that is the kind of performance and brand momentum many retailers would welcome. It did not stop the labor dispute from intensifying.

The union side says the pressure campaign is designed to hit REI where it matters most: the Anniversary Sale, which United Food and Commercial Workers says runs May 15-25 and is the company’s largest event of the year. UFCW said 70,000 REI workers and shoppers had pledged to boycott if the company continued bargaining in bad faith. REI, in a May 2 statement, said it met with UFCW and Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union locals from April 28-30 but could not reach an agreement, and said it remained ready to bargain in good faith. The company called the boycott “a disappointing move.”

The dispute has been building for months. REI, UFCW and RWDSU agreed in 2025 to a national bargaining structure for the 11 unionized stores. Then, on February 5, 2026, workers at those stores voted 98.5% against ratifying REI’s contract proposal. Since 2022, 11 REI stores have voted to unionize, turning the co-op’s labor relations into a recurring test of whether its public-facing values match what workers are willing to accept on the sales floor.

REI workers have used the Anniversary Sale as leverage before. In May 2024, workers in SoHo and Chicago walked off the job in unfair labor practice strikes during the event, showing how quickly a retail celebration can become a flashpoint. The AFL-CIO has also added REI to its boycott list, signaling that the conflict now sits inside the broader labor movement, not just inside one specialty retailer. For Target team members watching wages, scheduling and workplace voice across the industry, REI is a reminder that the gap between brand promise and employee experience can surface fast, and in public.