Miami, Florida-based Carnival Corporation, the largest British-American cruise operator, has announced that it will be executing a reduction in force at its various locations. It is anticipated that over 1,000 employees will be impacted. The layoffs will commence on June 1, 2020, and include 820 layoffs and 537 six-month furloughs. 4 employees at the company's Miramar, Florida offices are included.
Most of the positions involve sales and support of vacation cruises including personal vacation planners, vacation specialists, teleagents, and various support and service functions.
Carnival CEO Arnold Donald noted in a company-wide email addressed to the company's onshore team...
“In late March, I shared with you our intent to minimize the financial impact on each of you from the COVID-19 pandemic, if possible, through June. While many other companies in their efforts to ensure their survival took early actions in workforce reductions and pay cuts, we protected our employee base while doing everything in our power to give our company the best chance going forward.
While maintaining our focus on compliance, environmental protection, and health and safety, that has included tightening down to only necessary expenses, repatriating crews, terminating contractors, deferring most capital expenses, slowing down shipbuilding, eliminating stock dividends, eliminating senior executive cash salary payments, and mortgaging the majority of our fleet in order to raise cash and boost liquidity.
We have always operated under the principle of planning for the worst and hoping for the best. Unfortunately, it is clear that we must prepare for this pause to last longer than any of us would like, with no real certainty as to a partial restart date.
That brings me to where we are today and an extremely difficult decision — the need to further lower our outgoing cash flow by reducing our shoreside workforce. This reduction will include a combination of job eliminations and furloughs, and for those employees remaining, either a reduction of hours or salary reductions. This is a very difficult and painful decision for me to make knowing the serious impact this will have on so many of you. I make this decision knowing our best plan forward is to be in a position to ride out this adversity — in order to rise again as a vibrant firm that can call back those on furlough, restore salaries and bonuses, and regenerate the positive economic impact we have on so many of our other stakeholders that depend on our company.
To those leaving us through job eliminations, there are no real words to adequately thank you for your dedication and service, be it months of service or decades. Hopefully severance will lessen the impact somewhat, but I am encouraged by the knowledge that the talent and skills that have kept you here will continue to serve you well in the future no matter what you choose to do.
To those of you on furlough, you will continue to keep full health benefits, with the employee-paid portion being paid by the company. Your fate is not one of unimportance or under-performance, it is rather one of simply being in a role that is not needed during an extended total shutdown of our guest cruise operations. We hope to recall you as soon as we can, when we are sailing once again.
My deepest appreciation and thanks to each and every one of you for all that you have contributed and for all that you have been through. These are not the easiest or best of times. But there will be brighter days ahead when this difficult period shall pass and eventually be in our rear-view mirror. In the meantime, focus on your well-being, stay safe, protect your loved ones, and know I will do everything I can to see us through to that day where indeed we can once again set sail. Thank you."
The cruise industry has been severely impacted by the Chinese Virus pandemic with passengers fearing the spread of the virus in close quarters, lengthy quarantines in their cabins, and the loss of vacation destination availabilities and activities.
Change is coming. There will always be a tomorrow, no matter how much you may try to ignore it. There are no guarantees in life or promises for a bright future. Just because something bad hasn't happened yet, doesn't mean it won't. It can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere. No one is guaranteed to wake up tomorrow and still have a job by evening. Are you now wondering, Am I Next?