Legoland Florida in Winter Haven says it will lay off 234 entertainment workers by April

Yahoo

27-01-2025

First there was the layoff of Legoland's water skiing show entertainers a few weeks ago. Then on Thursday and Friday, hundreds more entertainment workers learned they too will lose their jobs.
'I have worked in entertainment for Legoland for the past 5 years and love my job,' said soon-to-be let go performer Kristen Pita in an email Friday. 'Tomorrow (Saturday) kicks off the Ninjago Days event and guests have no idea that many of the employees were just told that they are fired.
'First it started with the cancelation of the waterski show and now 234 people are being fired,' she said. 'It doesn't make any sense because the Sea Life Aquarium is opening in a few months inside the park and Peppa Pig opened a few years ago along with the Pirate Island Hotel on property.
'The guest attendance has been great for Legoland Florida,' Pita said. 'This news is heartbreaking and will affect many.'
She said many performers, including husbands and wives and fathers and sons, have mortgages or apartment leases to pay and some relocated from other areas, including some who switched from another theme park company to take a position at Legoland.
"I love the Merlin company, but this is blindsiding a lot of people," Pita said. She added, "All 234 performers will forever cherish the special guests' moment we had."
At meetings held Thursday and Friday, Pita said they learned an outside company would be providing performers for Lego characters in the parks and hotels. Little information was shared about the outside company or whether it would be rehiring the Legoland talent. With 234 employees gone of the 280 within its entertainment department, that leaves 46, mostly performers.
Legoland began laying off 234 entertainment workers on Saturday at its Winter Haven theme parks, a notification to employees and Commerce Florida said.
'We regret to inform you that you will be separated from your position within LEGOLAND Florida LLC due to a business restructuring specific to our operation,' the notice said. 'This action is expected to be permanent and will result in the separation of multiple employees.'
The notice sent to individual employees said its letter would serve to give the employees 60 days' advanced notice of the restructuring starting Saturday through April 7. The effective date of the employees' layoffs will be March 25.
Their health insurance benefits would end by April 1.
'At Legoland Resorts in North America we are making operational changes to help us elevate the guest experience in 2025 and beyond. This includes changes in how we deliver entertainment.," said Julia Estrada, its public relations director for North America.
'The decision to reduce the size of some of our teams was undoubtedly difficult, but these changes will allow the Resorts to operate more flexibly and responsively in a competitive market," she said.
'We will continue to have a core in-house entertainment offering, which we will scale up to meet our brand and guest experiences during the year," Estrada said. "This will include working with a global leader in this sector – who will be providing employment opportunities – to bolster our entertainment provision during seasonal special events. We are confident that the Resorts will still offer high-quality guest experiences, as part of our ongoing focus on creativity and innovation to offer memorable visits."
'We are supporting employees during this period of change and will do all we can to help them find alternative employment, including sharing audition opportunities within the external global entertainment provider.'
According to Financier Worldwide, Merlin Entertainments, which has theme parks in Florida, New York and California, is privately owned.
Merlin had offered publicly traded stock until November 2019 when it was taken private. Investors include a consortium, such as asset management company Blackstone and the Kristiansen family's investment company, which controls The Lego Group.
Legoland announced in December that it would cancel its long-running water ski show — Brickbeard's Watersport Stunt Show. The show was one of the last vestiges of the park's predecessor, Cypress Gardens, which was one of the state's first major tourist attractions. Water ski shows had been performed at the park since the 1940s.
In November 2022, Legoland announced in a layoff notice that 519 food and beverage workers would begin working for Aramark Corp. 'All personnel, duty positions and rates of pay will remain the same once the+ changeover to Aramark takes effect,' that notice said. 'All employees who currently possess benefits will automatically change over with no break in service."
This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Legoland in Winter Haven will lay off 234 entertainment workers