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AIRBNB PLANS TO shed 35% of its Dublin workforce.
Employees have been told that the company is targeting 190 redundancies at its European headquarters in Grand Canal Docks, because of the decline in its online bookings business as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
On 8 May, company chief executive and founder Brian Chesky announced that out of 7,500 employees globally, “nearly 1,900 teammates will have to leave Airbnb, comprising around 25% of our company”.
At the time of the announcement, it wasn’t clear if the cuts would significantly impact the company’s Dublin office, where it employs just over 500 people.
TheJournal.ie now understands that over half of the Dublin workforce, some 320 employees, are involved in a consultation process with the company, which will result in around 190 redundancies.
Airbnb could not confirm its exact employee headcount in the capital or the exact number of redundancies that would be sought. However, this website has seen internal communications sent to employees detailing plans for approximately 190 staff members to depart the company.
A spokesperson for the company confirmed that over 500 people were employed in Dublin and that around 35% of staff based in the capital would be made redundant as part of the company’s plans.
The Dublin figure is substantially higher than the global company-wide planned reduction of 25%.
Workers have been told that the Dublin customer service team will suffer the worst of the cuts with around 100 out of the targeted 190 redundancies coming from that team alone.
Chesky, the chief executive, said in his statement last month that the company had been “hit hard” by the sudden downturn in business, with revenue this year forecasted to be less than half of what was made in 2019.
“We are collectively living through the most harrowing crisis of our lifetime, and as it began to unfold, global travel came to a standstill.”
He said the company has raised $2 billion (about €1.8 billion) in capital and “dramatically cut costs” in response to the crisis.
The statement also informed employees outside the US that they “will receive at least 14 weeks of pay, plus tenure increases consistent with their country-specific practices”.
Although the company had a presence in Ireland from 2012, Airbnb announced plans to significantly ramp up its Irish operations on its company blog in 2013. In September that year, it publicly signalled its intention to set up European headquarters in Dublin.
Chesky said at the time that Dublin was chosen because Ireland “has hospitality in its DNA” and is known for its warm welcome. He added that the city was an emerging technology epicentre in Europe, with nearly every language represented.
In 2014, Airbnb moved its Dublin HQ from Lansdowne Road, Dublin 4 to the Watermarque building in Ringsend. It then moved to the Reflector Building on Hanover Quay — built by developer Michael Cotter’s Park Developments — in 2016, where it is currently based.
Airbnb’s short-term letting business model has put the company in the firing line of Irish policymakers in recent years.
Concerns about landlords withdrawing properties from the long-term rental market to rent out on a short-term basis resulted in the government bringing in new laws last year to curb the practice in areas where demand for rentals are high.
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You could say…they cleaned up.
(Badumm-tishhh)
I don’t get it
That is the best idea ever
You had 32 million reasons to think it up.
Why didn’t I think of that.
Immense amount of hard work from Jules and the rest of the founding team to make this happen. This company nearly folded not so long ago and they had to re-name, re-brand and re-focus to become a success. Anyone can have a great idea but the dedication and brains to make it work don’t often mix. Fair play and here’s to continued success!
Fair play to her
could have used something like this back in my “free gaf” days.
oh well, twas’ my parent’s loss really.
great advert…. I use handy for my cleaners. It’s very hit and miss whether you get a good one though
Clean up after yourself so.
If you hire a cleaner for 4 hours, they charge you 48 €. However they keep 8€ (for the credit card processing, and usage of the site), the cleaner only gets 40€ and as they are contractors they have to take care of the taxing etc.
Good business model for them, not so good for their cleaners.
So they should do it for free?
The contractors don’t have to use the website if they don’t want to.
Not free, but they charge 16.66% fee for essentially a billing and scheduling solution. Not even Hailo has that big of a fee (12.5%).
If you feel comfortable to have someone cleaning your house for less than a living wage, that is fine by me, but I intent to pay people a fair wage for their work. You might think different and contribute to the ever spiraling way down of wages.
Why not charge an amount that allows the cleaners a living wage for what is essentially hard work?
That can be done by either charging a reasonable fee or charging a higher amount per hour.
But it’s the business model they have and obviously the founders put a lot of work into it to make it a brand that helping thinks can benefit them and value as this price.
i do see your point Yggr , but the ever spirralling increases during the boom became unsustainable and some services became a complete joke , there were young lads sniffing coke on the nitelinks from the back of mobile phones braggin about how much cash they were pulling in as laborers on buiding sites in dublin – there are more sides to the story than trying to imply guilt for me not paying a ‘living wage to cleaners’ – have you thought that if the service was too expensive the numbers using it would drop so much it would just not succedd and there would be no business and fewer jobs – technology is opening up possibilities for new models for almost every sector , fair play to these people who managed to create a success in the cleaning sector – unsurprisingly there is the ususal irish begruggery doin the rounds no matter what you do. Addressing issues like the minimum wage and other social issues are a mtter for government policy to address not people who want to try create a successful business.
10.6 million each. Take the leftover 200,000 and put it all on red!
Do we have anything like this in Ireland though?
I mean all Ireland and not just Dublin like Hassle.
It rolls out gradually, there have been huge roadblocks and hills to overcome to just get it to Dublin. Hailo is actually a much lighter model that doesn’t vet or examine their drivers I’m sure.
My colleagues and I launched upChore a few months ago. We are in Dublin, launching in Waterford next week and expect to be in Belfast by January.
have your say