Staff of the satire website The Onion has unionized

CHICAGO — The staff of the humourwebsite The Onion has decided to unionize.

Workers at the website and its sisters, A.V. Club and ClickHole, will be represented in collective bargaining talks by the Writers Guild of America East and will negotiate with the owners, including the Spanish-language broadcaster Univision.

A.V. Club’s deputy managing director, Caitlin PenzeyMoog, says staffers began exploring union representation six months ago, with 90 per cent of the workers signing union cards by last week.

PenzeyMoog says digital media is a precarious industry and she’s seen some peers suffer while others have thrived with union protection.

Onion Inc. spokesman David Ford told the Chicago Tribune the company has begun discussions with the guild and “hope to arrive at an arrangement in short order.”

The Onion was founded in 1988 by two University of Wisconsin students.

The paper relocated its editorial operations to Chicago from New York in 2012 and went all-digital the following year.