Second Las Vegas call center closing, 95 jobs disappearing

Monday, March 12, 2001 | 11:17 a.m.

The Las Vegas call center of Lillian Vernon Corp. will close in early May, throwing 95 people out of work, the company announced Friday.

Lillian Vernon, a 50-year-old specialty catalog and Internet retailer offering household, kitchen, gardening and children's products, blamed the shaky national economy for the need to streamline the corporation.

Wayne Palladino, chief financial officer for Lillian Vernon, said the company is reducing its salaried workforce by 12 percent in a corporate restructuring.

Palladino said the 95 Las Vegas workers, who operate from a center at 750 Pilot Road, would not be offered transfers to either the company's main call center in Virginia Beach, Va., or at corporate headquarters in Rye, N.Y.

It was the second call center closure announced in Las Vegas in a month. Officials with Verizon Wireless said in February that it would close five of its 33 call centers and relocate 180 of its 400 Las Vegas employees to other regional centers in a corporate restructuring.