Met Gala Strike Averted: Condé Nast and Union Have Tentative Deal on First Contract

Katie Kilkenny
·4 min read

After negotiations went down to the wire Sunday, Condé Nast has reached a tentative deal with a union representing hundreds of its workers and averted a strike that would have coincided with the Met Gala.

The Condé Union — which represents around 550 staffers at brands including Vogue, Vanity Fair, GQ, Bon Appétit, Allure, Architectural Digest, Condé Nast Traveler, Epicurious, Glamour, Teen Vogue, Self and Condé Nast Entertainment — and the company announced the provisional agreement Monday. Details were not immediately available about the deal, which, if ratified by the union’s membership, will be the first labor contract for this group of workers. (Writers at The New Yorker and Wired are represented by different unions.)

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A source says the deal was sealed after 3 a.m. ET.

Negotiators for the Condé Union and management held marathon negotiating sessions in the week and weekend prior to the Met Gala to attempt to avert a work stoppage threatened by the union. The Condé Union was planning a 48-hour strike that would have started Monday and would have included a red carpet-themed protest outside of Vogue‘s flagship Met Gala event Monday night. Negotiators only just barely avoided that possibility with proposals that were swapped Sunday night.

It remains to be seen how the two parties resolved some of their lingering issues. As of Sunday afternoon, the two sides were still engaging on issues including salary minimums, health care options for trans workers and the union’s desire to convert long-term freelancers into staff members. They were also attempting to reach compromise on a round of layoffs that management first announced in November 2023, intended to trim 5 percent of the workforce. The union was seeking to reduce the number of cuts and amplify the severance package that laid-off employees will receive when they leave the company.

The union says that it secured $3.6 million in wage increases, 14 weeks of paid parental leave, the end of two-tier permanence employment, hybrid work protections and guaranteed comp time after 40 hours of work.

And with regard to the layoffs that have been in the works for months, the union says it secured eight weeks of severance with all applicable wage increases; employment through ratification; additional lump-sum payments and COBRA coverage; and a layoff moratorium through the end of July.

“We are happy to have a contract that reflects and supports our core values — our content and journalism; our commitment to diversity and professional development; our industry-leading hiring practices and our competitive wages and benefits,” the company wrote in a memo to employees Monday morning.

“We made a commitment to do whatever it takes to get our contract,” said Mark Alan Burger, Vanity Fair social media manager and a member of the Condé Union bargaining team. “Our pledge to take any action necessary to get our contract, including walking off the job ahead of the Met Gala, and all the actions we took this week, pushed the company to really negotiate. We made every effort this week to meet with them and get this contract completed and we’re thrilled to say we did it.”

The two parties began negotiating their first labor contract after management voluntarily recognized the union in September 2022. The process became increasingly contentious in recent months, with both sides filing unfair labor practice charges against the other with the National Labor Relations Board (both cases are still open at the NLRB). In January, the union called a 24-hour walkout on the day of the Academy Awards nominations in protest of bargaining practices they alleged were regressive. (Condé Nast did not comment on the strike at the time.)

In March, the company further irked the union by adding staffers to the list of workers it sought to lay off as the talks dragged on.

In an interview Sunday prior to the news of the deal, Bon Appétit culinary producer and interim vp of Condé Nast Entertainment bargaining unit, Mallory Santucci, said she would be “thrilled” with an agreement. She added, “At the end of the day, our goal as a union is to get a fair contract. Our goal is not to strike.”

Alex Weprin contributed to this report.

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