Jan 18, 2023

Nickelodeon Animation Studios Voluntarily Recognizes TAG as Production Workers' Bargaining Representative

Nickelodeon Studios has agreed to voluntarily recognize the Animation Guild as the bargaining representative of the studio's production workers.

Last December, a super majority of Nickelodeon Studios production workers voted in favor of unionizing with the Animation Guild (TAG) and IATSE Local 839 and began working on their first collective bargaining agreement. The production workers joined more than 400 Nickelodeon artists already represented by TAG at the time.

After the vote, Nickelodeon was presented with a request for voluntary recognition. The company's attorneys instead chose to strategically exclude these groups of workers based on their job titles, taking advantage of "common misunderstandings about labor laws to unnecessarily prolong the process."

Now, however, the company has reversed course and all 177 production workers are represented by TAG. To date, this is the largest bargaining unit of production workers organized under the Animation Guild.

The organizing committee responsible for the push toward unionization stated in a release:

The organizing committee is overwhelmingly thrilled that Nickelodeon Animation Studios has decided to voluntarily recognize production workers as members of the Animation Guild. By doing so, the studio has demonstrated that it is willing and ready to recognize the hard work, time and love we put into our work. We are very pleased to have been able to work with them and our artist colleagues to reach an agreement that reiterates their support for our work."

Steve Kaplan, TAG's business representative, added:

Nickelodeon Animation Studios was able to reach an agreement that recognizes both the determination of the animation production workers and our longstanding productive labor relations. We are pleased. We look forward to negotiating a successor agreement.

And Brian Keene, Executive Vice President of Production and Operations for Nickelodeon Animation Studios, stated Our studio's working relationship with the Animation Guild is long-standing and we look forward to negotiating an agreement with the union covering this new group of employees.