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Blake Lively is in hot water — and more or less accused of hypocrisy.
Just days after Ryan Reynolds poked fun at Meghan Markle’s lifestyle brand, folks from his wife’s defunct lifestyle company are calling her out.
They describe a “toxic” work experience at the “absolute disaster” that was Preserve.
It’s true that this changes nothing about Justin Baldoni and that many of the complaints are about Lively’s brother. But it’s not a good look for the actress, either.
Former staffers are calling out Blake Lively
When it rains, it pours.
Years ago, Blake Lively had her short-lived lifestyle company, Preserve.
These lifestyle brands can catapult a celebrity’s financial standing or lead to humiliation.
In 2014, Lively was in her mid-20s. She launched Preserve, which sold artisanal home goods as lifestyle brands tend to do. Within a year, it went belly-up.
Now, six former staffers are describing their former workplace as “toxic,” “unprofessional,” and “chaotic.”
Speaking to The Daily Mail on May 19, one staffer characterized: “The entire company was an absolute disaster.”
“The workplace allegations that Blake is making now [against Justin Baldoni] are deeply ironic,” the staffer claimed.
This was “given that it was one of the most insane, toxic, emotionally draining, and disorganized environments you could imagine.”
A lot of this is about her brother allegedly running things
“The impression [Lively] left on me after I worked at Preserve is that she doesn’t care,” a second erstwhile staffer opined. “It was a really toxic work environment.”
One got specific, recalling when Lively was supposed to host a photoshoot at her home, only to come out of the house “looking like an absolute mess.”
That’s not really workplace harassment, but it might be unprofessional.
A number of complaints had to do with Eric Lively, her brother, who was apparently the creative director of the company.
Former staffers alleged that Eric “overslept” often, with some recalling employees waiting outside in the cold before being let in to work.
“[Eric] was completely unqualified to run a company,” one former employee reported.
“There were a lot of ways in which the employment was unprofessional.”
Another noted: “For many weeks or months, there were no desks. The irony of it being a lifestyle site that was selling these really expensive wares was not lost on anyone.”
Then came the financial side of things …
Despite working “a crazy amount” of hours, at least two employees recalled struggling when they were not paid on time.
However, they ultimately received sizable pay. When the former staffers threatened legal action, they reportedly received settlements of up to $300,000, seemingly to keep the mess “buried.”
For the record, Lively has spoken about regretting having been “unable to figure out” some “behind the scenes stuff” from Preserve.
It is good to own up to mistakes, but that does not undo them.
While a clumsily run workplace is probably not comparable to the allegations of a smear campaign and sexual misconduct that Lively has brought against Baldoni, that sounds like a miserable time in the lives of those erstwhile staffers.
No one should be paid late, or have to wait around for an employer who is having organizational struggles or just doesn’t know what they’re doing.
Sure, everyone makes mistakes. But furniture not arriving for months is an underlying leadership problem, not a whoopsy-doodle processing error.
We’re sure that Lively would not repeat those mistakes if she were to re-launch her brand (which, in the current climate, we would not recommend).
