According to officials with UFCW Local 5, which represents Bay Area Safeway employees, union officials were asked to hold back picket lines just after midnight Saturday. The strikes could soon affect over 200 stores throughout the region as 25,000 union workers continue to demand higher wages and better benefits.

UFCW Local 5 and UFCW Local 648 have reached a tentative agreement with Safeway, averting a planned strike that would have been the first regional labor stoppage against the company in nearly three decades,

Local union representatives from United Food and Commercial Workers announced a tentative agreement Sunday with Albertsons Companies amid a planned strike of nearly 25,000 employees.• Video Above: A Brief History of the Federal Minimum Wage Albertsons Companies is the parent company of Safeway and Vons grocery stores.