For all the aspiring Anna Wintours out there; you are going to have to find a new place to intern. Condé Nast is ending its program.
Starting 2014, the publication company will no longer offer a student internship program. After being sued by two former interns for being paid less than minimum wage, the company has decided to just scrap the program altogether. Lauren Ballinger, who interned for W in 2009, and Matthew Lieb who interned for The New Yorker in 2009 and 2010 sued the conglomerate claiming they were paid less than $1 an hour for their work. Their lawsuits are still pending.
The choice to eliminate the internship program altogether will not affect the interns already working for the company. However, this decision could be a total game changer. Without an internship program at Condé Nast, that takes loads of major magazines off the table for aspiring editors. Vogue, Teen Vogue, GQ, Glamour, Vanity Fair and more are no longer viable options to gain experience from. Considering the industry cites internships as one of the best ways to breaking into the world of fashion journalism, it is going to become a lot harder to make a name for yourself in the industry.
Condé Nast however isn’t the only publication company that has taken heat for not paying interns enough. Hearst has also been having problems with unhappy interns. Hearst however, still has an internship program. Condé Nast’s response seems a bit extreme, but intensity has always kind of been Wintour’s thing. And while we know she doesn’t run Condé Nast as a whole we know she secretly runs the entire world.
Featured photo: Getty
