Six labor activists from Denmark recently visited the International Brotherhood of Teamsters where they shared ideas for organizing with their U.S. counterparts.

The reason for their visit was simple: learn what U.S. unions—especially the Teamsters—are doing to organize. The activists are from HK, Denmark’s second largest labor union.

As Per Tonnesen, a local president of HK explained, although 70 percent of the Danish work force is unionized, HK’s membership is faltering.

“We want to increase our membership and we are here to exchange experiences with our American colleagues,” Tonnesen said. “We can learn a lot from this visit because organizing in America is a very hard competition. Laws here are structured against organized labor, yet the Teamsters prevail.”

Tonnesen would like to see HK transformed from a service union into an organizing union with a structure similar to that of the Teamsters. HK currently has 320,000 members in four sectors: community, state, private and commercial.