The Walt Disney Company will lay off 28,000 of its California-based employees after facing prolonged closures of its theme parks due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Josh D’Amaro, head of parks at Disney, sent a letter to employees on Tuesday detailing the company’s “difficult decisions” it has had to make amid the pandemic that has devastated much of the entertainment industry.
“As you can imagine, a decision of this magnitude is not easy,” D’Amaro wrote in the letter obtained by CNBC. “For the last several months, our management team has worked tirelessly to avoid having to separate anyone from the company. We’ve cut expenses, suspended capital projects, furloughed our cast members while still paying benefits, and modified our operations to run as efficiently as possible, however, we simply cannot responsibly stay fully staffed while operating at such limited capacity.”
D’Amaro reported that about 67% of the 28,000 workers were part-time employees. The company has not commented on how many employees from its parks were laid off.
Disney’s other theme parks in Florida, Paris, Shanghai, Japan, and Hong Kong have been able to reopen to limited capacity, but California Adventure and Disneyland have remained shut down.
