Orlando distributor paid union-busting firm to persuade workers to ditch union

A supplies and packaging distributor in Orlando hired a notorious union-busting firm last month to convince delivery drivers to get rid of their union, federal records show.

According to a union official with the Teamsters, the workers’ union representative, the drivers ultimately voted against keeping their union this month — after their employer Imperial Dade, a company taken over by private equity in recent years, brought in a team of professional union busters.

Federal records show their employer entered into a contractual agreement in July with Quest Consulting, a Nevada-based firm that has run campaigns to squash organizing drives at Amy’s Kitchen, global beverage distributor Refresco and Hampton Inn, among other companies. The firm reported $2.3 million in earnings last year, billing rates of at least $300 an hour per consultant.

Delivery drivers for Imperial Dade, a food service and janitorial supplies distributor headquartered in New Jersey, voted 34 to 8 to join the Teamsters Local 385 in Orlando last May, after narrowly voting against unionization in 2019. Under federal labor law, a simple majority of workers must then vote to join the union in order to approve union representation.

“After months of working profusely and having clear goals, it is my pleasure to announce that we’ve won our campaign,” said driver Federico Rincon in a statement last year. “Drivers demand fair pay for an honest day of work, and we are going to get it now that we are Teamsters.”

Not everyone was happy, however. According to the National Labor Relations Board, a group of workers filed a follow-up petition in early July of this year, seeking to remove the Teamsters as their union representative — a process that’s permitted at least one year after a union is first certified. Petitioners listed the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, an anti-union nonprofit that commonly aids in decertification campaigns, as their legal counsel. A week later, the employer then reportedly hired Quest Consulting to help persuade employees to vote out the union.

Firms like Quest are required under the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act to disclose when they’re hired by employers to “persuade” workers on whether to form a union by filing reports with the U.S. Department of Labor. Although actual enforcement of this requirement is spotty, the Economic Policy Institute estimates that employers spend more than $400 million annually on these union-busting consultants, also known as “persuaders.”

Part of what these consultants are supposed to disclose is terms of payment. Although Quest Consulting president Jessica Thomas did not disclose how much Imperial Dade agreed to pay her firm this time around, records show Imperial Dade agreed to pay her firm’s consultants $300 to $450 an hour this past January to similarly persuade employees in Massachusetts against unionization with the Teamsters. “All consultants billed between $300.00 to $450.00 an hour including travel and expenses,” Thomas wrote in her report.

Thomas dispatched two consultants for this latest job in Orlando, according to her report: Daniel Block of Kentucky (who got caught in 2022 trying to bust a pizza workers union in Austin, Texas) and Fernando Rivera of California (who has been hired in the past to similarly persuade Amazon delivery drivers against joining forces with the Teamsters).

Quest Consulting, a firm known for offering bilingual services, was founded in 2019 by Lupe Cruz, a former organizer for the hospitality union Unite Here who later switched sides to join the lucrative union avoidance industry. Through his former firm, Cruz & Associates, Cruz consulted for the likes of Hilton and even Trump Hotels. During a 2015 union drive at Trump International Hotel Las Vegas, Trump Hotels reportedly paid out more than half a million dollars to Cruz’s firm that year for “consultation services and employee education services,” per a disclosure form.

Union membership has been linked to higher pay and more equitable pay across racial lines. Union contracts can also include stipulations on worker safety and improved job benefits, like more affordable healthcare, paid leave and better retirement options.

Union-busting consultants, however, will often turn to familiar anti-union talking points, highlighting union dues, claiming union officials are looking solely to pad their own pockets. Some, including consultants affiliated with Quest, have been accused of using ethnic and linguistic differences between workers to sow division during union drives.

Teamsters Local 385, based in Orlando, is a local union affiliated with the International Brotherhood of the Teamsters, a labor union that represents 1.3 million workers in North America. In Central Florida, Local 385 represents workers employed by UPS, Breakthru Beverages, the Osceola County school system and character performers like Mickey Mouse at Disney World. The union has faced off against union-busting consultants before.

This post has been updated to correct a quote from Thomas on how much Quest consultants billed for a job for Imperial Dade in Massachusetts.

Subscribe to Orlando Weekly newsletters.

Follow us: Apple News | Google News | NewsBreak | Reddit | Instagram | Facebook | Bluesky | Or sign up for our RSS Feed

This article appears in Aug 6-12, 2025.