Condé Nast Union to Protest in Anna Wintour’s Neighborhood Amid Bargaining: ‘She Has the Power to Influence Management’

The Condé Nast Union is planning another form of protest against management amid contract bargaining by visiting the neighborhood of global chief content officer Anna Wintour in an effort to bring “management closer to an agreement.”

The union will distribute informational leaflets about their cause starting at 6 p.m. ET in New York City on Sullivan Street between Bleecker and Houston. The fliers read “Anna wears Prada: workers get nada,” with a reference to the upcoming Met Gala. The initiative was designed to “elevate the union’s message of their contract fight as rich execs like Wintour look to cut jobs,” the union said in a statement.

“We are really committed to getting a fair contract, but we know that Anna Wintour has never been to a single bargaining session,” Mark Alan Burger, a social media manager for Vanity Fair and member of the union bargaining team, told TheWrap. “And yet, she’s the face of Condé Nast for all intents and purposes.”

Burger added that he believes Wintour “has the power to influence management’s side at the table. So we’re taking it to her and saying we are the workforce, that gets the work done.”

While the company employs some of the industry’s top talent, “They’re being dismissed and treated like they don’t deserve equal salary floors,” the union bargaining member told TheWrap.

Management, Burger noted, has been “hemming and hawing over these layoffs without providing any sort of concrete plans for the future of the company.”

In November, CEO Roger Lynch announced that Condé Nast would be cutting around 5 percent of its workforce, which would impact around 270 employees. Over 400 unionized Condé Nast employees staged a walkout in January in response. Then in March, according to the union, management added five more staffers to their layoff list, just two weeks after Lynch said he had no further plans for job cuts in an interview with Axios.

“We’re really excited to take it to [Wintour] and hopefully it can shake her into getting management closer to an agreement on this contract,” the Vanity Fair social media manager told TheWrap.

Puck News’ Lauren Sherman first reported the news of the union action and flyer distribution plan on Thursday.

“The fliers are designed to share with the public, particularly those who live in Wintour’s exclusive neighborhood, the plight of members of Condé Union, who have been fighting for a fair contract since 2022 and against layoffs since November,” the union said in a statement.

The Condé Nast Union and management have been engaged in a bitter feud for months, with the union arguing that leadership is unwilling to come to a compromise.

In March, Condé Nast management filed an unfair labor practice charge against the union, arguing that they are engaging in “bad-faith, surface bargaining” by not addressing their “workforce reduction proposal seriously.”

In response, the Condé Nast Union called for a protest inside executives’ offices to combat additional layoffs that they say were threatened at a contentious bargaining session.

The post Condé Nast Union to Protest in Anna Wintour’s Neighborhood Amid Bargaining: ‘She Has the Power to Influence Management’ appeared first on TheWrap.