The Sesame Workshop has averted a picket line outside its New York headquarters, as a new contract deal with its unionized writers was reached on Friday afternoon.
Sesame Workshop announced the deal hours before the nonprofit’s current labor contract with its writers expired. “We value our writers and their significant contributions to the creative process, which are integral to our ability to deliver on our nonprofit mission. This agreement is a testament to our dedication to our creative talent, and we appreciate the WGA’s collaboration in working with us to establish this new industry benchmark.”
The Writers Guild of America confirmed the deal, with the Sesame Workshop negotiating committee adding in a statement, “We are so proud to work for an organization that values its writers, and we believe this new contract will positively impact writers throughout the children’s media landscape. ‘S; truly is for Solidarity. We are glad to have a contract in place that allows Sesame to do what it does best – lead.”
The new deal expands the union’s contractually-covered work at Sesame Workshop to include writing for animation and social media.
The writers, who work on writing Sesame Street, Helpsters and The Not Too Late Show With Elmo, first announced on Tuesday that they had unanimously authorized a strike if a deal was not reached by their latest contract’s expiration on Friday. The Writers Guild of America East and West represents 35 writers under the Sesame Workshop contract.
During the negotiations, the union particularly sought to include writing for animation and social media under its contract. If achieved, that change would expand the size of the bargaining unit. The labor group also advocated for higher annual raises, fixed residuals for projects appearing on streaming platforms, performance-based bonus when their work succeeds on those platforms, a paid parental leave fund and guardrails on the use of AI in the workplace.
On the union side, the talks were led by WGA East director of contract enforcement & credits Geoff Betts while Sesame Workshop svp of production management, operations, business affairs and legal Taska Carrigan represented management.
More to come.