Some 10,000 grocery store workers across the greater Denver area went on strike Thursday, claiming unfair and illegal negotiating practices by King Soopers while their union has been negotiating a new contract with the store chain.

King Soopers, a chain owned by Kroger, with 121 stores in Colorado and Wyoming, has been negotiating a new contract with the union since October.

Unionized King Soopers workers in Broomfield, Boulder and Louisville will join their fellow United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 members from around the Denver metro area in a two-week strike beginning at 5 a.

Workers at 77 King Soopers stores on the Front Range are readying to take to the picket lines Thursday morning at 5 a.m.​, with no apparent resolution in sight.

Grocery workers at many King Soopers locations across the Front Range will begin striking on Thursday, the United Food and Commercial Workers Local 7 announced Monday morning.

Sadly, this Company’s targeting of fixed-income retirees and other vulnerable populations only compounds its history of targeting consumers with predatory pricing,” union president

King Soopers has filed a lawsuit accusing United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 7 union, which represents its employees, of forcing the supermarket chain to bargain with labor unions that are out of state.

Colorado King Soopers filed a federal lawsuit Friday against UFCW Local 7 for the recent grocery store worker strike. The company claims UFCW Local 7 is “unlawfully forcing the Company to bargain with labor unions from Washington and California – that do not represent its associates – to push an impermissible agenda at the bargaining table.