Context and Disclosure
I have been an REI member since 1989. REI is also an affiliate merchant partner of Backpacking Light, which means Backpacking Light may earn revenue when readers purchase from REI through affiliate links. We have a business interest in REI’s continued success.
That relationship does not remove our responsibility to scrutinize REI’s conduct when its decisions affect workers, members, and the broader outdoor community. Consumer advocacy is one of Backpacking Light’s core values. Many Backpacking Light members are also REI members, and both organizations ask for members’ trust. Since we facilitate commercial transactions between REI and our members, we feel a responsibility to ensure our members have as much transparency and insight as possible into the conduct of the affiliate merchants we recommend and represent, including REI.
This article is not an attempt to adjudicate the labor dispute between REI and the REI Union. It is a document-based analysis of what the available record supports, what remains disputed, and what REI members cannot yet verify from public statements alone.
A Labor Dispute Becomes a Trust Problem
REI says it is making difficult financial decisions to protect the long-term health of the co-op. The REI Union says the company is using financial pressure as cover for bargaining conduct that the union alleges is unlawful, including deeper cuts at union stores.
The available record supports parts of both accounts. It proves neither in full.
REI’s financial pressure is documented. The co-op reported a $54.3 million net loss in 2025, following a $156.4 million loss in 2024 (Recreational Equipment, Inc., 2026a). But REI was not without liquidity. It ended 2025 with $380.4 million in cash and cash equivalents and $158.8 million in short-term investments, for a combined cash and short-term investment position of about $539.2 million (Recreational Equipment, Inc., 2026a). REI also had no outstanding borrowings under its $300 million credit agreement at year-end (Recreational Equipment, Inc., 2026a).
The benefit changes are documented in REI’s own materials. REI’s Mid-Year Total Rewards Update confirms changes to retirement contributions, vacation accrual, sick leave, vacation cashout, holiday pay for part-time employees, and starting hourly rates for new hires (Recreational Equipment, Inc., 2026b).
From the perspective of an REI Member, I feel a little bit in the dark. The problem is less about the issues being debated (most of these issues, whether related to co-op financial health or labor rights, are worth debating). Instead, the problem is what each side asks members to accept beyond the facts we have access to today.
The union’s public campaign sometimes compresses unresolved legal claims, worker-impact estimates, and arguments about motive into language that sounds more settled than the record allows. REI’s public statements do something similar from the other direction, presenting its position as “straightforward facts” while leaving important questions unanswered.
This is not only a labor dispute. For REI members, it is a trust dispute: whether a member-owned co-op has provided enough evidence for workers and members to evaluate whether its bargaining strategy, benefit changes, and public messaging are necessary, lawful, and consistent with co-op values.
Source Note and Limits of This Report
This report is based on REI’s public newsroom statements, REI’s audited 2025 financial statements, REI’s 2026 financial results and impact report announcement, REI’s Mid-Year Total Rewards Update provided by the REI Union and authorized for quotation, written responses attributable to the REI Union, public-record NLRB complaint materials, and background bargaining and legal documents provided by the union but not authorized for quotation or reproduction.
REI was asked for comment and directed Backpacking Light to two public newsroom statements: one addressing bargaining status and the union’s planned boycott, and another titled “Some Straightforward Facts About REI Co-op’s Union Negotiations.” In those statements, REI says it bargained in good faith, remains ready to negotiate, and lawfully implemented certain economic terms after impasse (Recreational Equipment, Inc., 2026c; Recreational Equipment, Inc., 2026d).
The REI Union provided written responses attributable to the union, along with supporting documents. Some documents were provided as background and are not quoted directly here. Those documents informed the reporting but are not reproduced or distributed. Public-record materials and documents authorized for quotation are cited directly where used.
Several material questions remain unresolved because neither side has publicly disclosed all bargaining proposals, projected savings, complete worker-impact data, or a final legal adjudication of the current impasse dispute.
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Discussion
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Companion forum thread to: REI’s Labor Fight Is a Test of Co-op Trust
Documents show benefit changes, financial pressure, and unresolved legal questions. They also show how little members can verify from public statements alone.
I am always skeptical about this guy because he promotes heavy gear, but he gives his take on REI and at 5:40 goes into the whole union thing. He also basically says REI caters to wealthy elites and delves into politics when they shouldn’t, however I believe his assertion that their prices are too exorbitant has started to turn around. The sale they just had featured a lot of unbeatable prices on top quality gear.
Let’s call it what it is. Some greedy corporate types saw REI as a potential golden goose of bonuses and lucrative salaries. They wormed their way in saying they were going to expand REI, but instead, slowly took it over with questionable Board practices. They are doing everything co-op members hate about corporations. I hope the leadership remembers what happen to Target, which has a very diverse customer base. What does REI think is going to happen when it pisses off a customer base of granola munching, tree hugging environmentalists? To be clear, we support REI, we do NOT support the current crop of greedy executives that want to turn REI into the Walmart box store of outdoor gear.
As a lifelong granola-creating (and munching), tree and rock hugging, committed conservationist, I agree – we don’t want REI to turn into a Walmart of gear. And it isn’t, as far as I can see. I hate the new benefits offerings though, they really suck. Less vaca, less wellness, less money to allow the worker bees the opportunity to some day stop working. It all sucks, it’s honestly pathetic. Why are we the older generation allowing our entire society to screw over young people and give them zero hope for the future? for greed? We got ours and now you can’t have any? What is wrong with our country? Does no one think of anything except, doesn’t affect me so I don’t care? And what pigs the execs are, truly. Yuck.
Thanks Ryan for sharing the info with us. Also joined in 1989! At least that’s what my online account says. But I remember shopping there way before then. The Minnesota store was a little grungy, with all the outdoor stuff no one else had. Kid in a candy shop.
Interesting stuff. Yes, questionable Board practices are always a risk.
But tell me: what does the REI Constitution say? Or Articles of Association?
I ask, because I was once involved in a power struggle over a very large and moderately affluent Society, where the (residual) Board members did not want to lose power and refused to acknowledge the results of a recent correctly-called Board Election. So I organised an Annual General Meeting (which was overdue by almost a year). Our Constitution stated, very clearly, that a vote at a properly-called AGM had the final authority, even over the Board.
I moved that ‘this AGM remove the current Board, who ever they were, and elect a new Board at this meeting.’
Detail: I had proxies from something like 80% of the known membership in my hand.
If there really is a problem in the eyes of the membership, can the membership of REI do something similar?
Cheers
Costco charges yearly. Amazon monthly. REI, once and done. Designed to fail. It might take 50 years, but it’s unsustainable. It’s a quasi pyramid.
Separate from the employee issues, which at least as my friend who is currently employed there says are not good conditions at his store-bad management, not interested in putting experienced employees in the departments they are experts in, etc. I read a comment from another employee who summed it up perfectly IMO-‘They have managed to alienate their entire customer base, which is extremely hard to do.’
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