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STATE OF THE UNIONS
Florescent orange and unequivocal, the flyer read “Shame!” and listed the contractor by name.
That contractor, Alexander Gurevich, of Continental Funding, L.L.C., answered a call from City Hall, but would not comment regarding his alleged use of nonunion labor for a project on 49th between Second and Third avenues.
The flyers were attached by clipboard to a giant inflatable rat.
Towering rats, cockroaches and pigs have become standards in unions disputes around New York, almost always present when unions want to call attention to companies or contractors using nonunion labor.
The animals first started migrating to cities like New York from Illinois, where Big Sky Balloons is based. The company, which is owned by Mike O’Connor, made its first animal, a rat, in 1990, after being commissioned by a Chicago union representative.
O’Connor, who has been a hot air ballooner for 27 years, drew a rendering of a rat.
His customer wanted something a little different.
“More fangs and festering nipples … menacing,” O’Connor recalled of their request for changes.
He honored this request, and made “Scabby the Rat” a reality for his client.
Before long, O’Connor’s family business was servicing just about every type of union imaginable, from carpenters to asbestos removers.
Today, rats are his biggest selling item, and O’Connor, who describes himself as “pro-union,” has sold 200-250 of them to unions in the New York-New Jersey area.
O’Connor said there are some competitors producing cheaper spin-offs of his products, but that Big Sky still gets “a majority of the orders.”
He credits New York with making the rat his biggest seller. That balloon, he said, has become a kind of “icon,” has inspired a song and even appeared on an episode of “The Sopranos.”
The other members of Big Sky’s menagerie include “The Greedy Pig,” skunks, bulldogs and cockroaches. All have been used by unions in New York.
Big Sky’s newest addition is the Corporate Fat Cat, clad in a pin-striped suit and smoking a cigar, which was commissioned by the New York asbestos workers’ union.
He said that animal “demonstrations” by unions have not yet resulted in any real backlash, at least not for him. But when questioned about this he told the story of a man from a union who called him up and asked if his company had any “giant cats.”
O’Connor remembered a 20-foot cougar Big Sky had made for Lincoln Mercury, and he happened to have an extra without the carmaker’s logo on it, which he rented out to the caller. That caller turned out to be the president of a bank in Kenatigue, Illinois that was using nonunion labor. He set it up, towering over two rats, for a day.