Diageo to Lay Off 305 Workers At WTC Hub As Alcohol Consumption Slides
The beverage giant—which is the parent company of Guinness, Johnnie Walker, and Smirnoff—is undertaking a $1.2 billion reconstruction plan, as Americans drink less. As of September, the company will lay off more one-third of the staff at its North American headquarters.
| 28 Aug 2026 | 12:36
The beverage giant Diageo is laying off more than one-third of its workforce at its North American headquarters, located at 3 World Trade Center, as Americans drink less. (
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Diageo has its global headquarters located in London, England. While North American sales are falling, the company said was seeing stronger sales in Europe. (
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Diageo, which owns flagship beverage brands such as Guinness and Johnnie Walker, will be letting go of more than a third of the workforce employed at its FiDi office this fall.
An August 21 WARN (Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification) notices revealing that 305 out of the 839 employees who currently work at 3 World Trade Center will lose their jobs, for a total headcount reduction of 36 percent. The layoffs, which were first reported by Crain’s New York Business, will be permanent and will begin on Sept. 30.
The news comes as the company undertakes a $1.2 billion restructuring, precipitated in part by the company running into particular difficulty with its North American operations recently. After all, fewer and fewer people are drinking nationwide. In a recent poll conducted by YouGov, only 54 percent of sampled Americans said that they consumed alcohol in 2025, which was a record low.
A June report noted that Diageo CEO Sir Dave Lewis had handed over “cost-reduction” targets to the company’s executive committee, a process that would ostensibly include layoffs. Then, earlier this month, he reportedly spoke bluntly to investors about the state of the business: “It fair to say our North American business has been underperforming for quite a while.”
Specifically, according to their latest fiscal year report, North American sales at the company had plummeted 8.4 percent; part of this is attributable to a massive decline in tequila consumption by U.S. consumers.
The aforementioned restructuring of the business is supposed to address difficulty in other markets, too, with East Asian sales being hammered by Chinese government restrictions on white spirits (baijiu). Organic net sales were down 0.2 percent overall.
However, it appears that people on other continents are drinking plenty of Diageo products, with Latin America and the Caribbean seeing a 7.7 percent boost in sales. Europe, the report notes, is still enjoying “continued strong Guinness momentum.” The company’s African sales, meanwhile, have seen a boost of 13.3 percent.
“We are working on recovering our competitiveness in NAM [North America],” Lewis said in a statement. Addressing the $1.2 billion restructuring, he added that “the revised operating framework is being rolled out across Diageo and the changes are significant...these savings will allow us to invest in the turnaround without needing to reduce operating profit.”
“As we close out the year I would like to put on record our appreciation for all Diageo colleagues and the way they have engaged with this change programme,” Lewis concluded.
Diageo, which has a market capitalization of roughly $52 billion, saw its stock trading at $93.66 when the market closed on August 26. While up from a 52-week low of around $72, this still represents a marked decline from 2022, when Diageo stock traded at over $200 a share.
The company was founded in 1997, as a merger between Dublin-based Guinness and the British hospitality conglomerate Grand Metropolitan. The name “Diageo” is a Latin portmanteau that roughly translates to “Day-Earth,” meant to tie into the company’s branding as a maker of products consumed “every day, everywhere.”