Gamers First Makes Strategic Staff Cuts in June

Credit: G1

The Esports Advocate has learned that Austin, Texas-based esports organization Gamers First, Inc. (G1) made several strategic staff cuts in the month of June.

Three employees were let go during the month of June including Executive Assistant / Manager Yasmin Schancer, Director of Event Operations Jackie Wolfram, and GM of Esports/ Director of Optimization Marcus Lovejoy.

G1 CEO and Founder Kenny Vaccaro told TEA in an emailed response on Friday that these cuts were strategic, as the company looks to fill important leadership roles:

“The layoffs were very strategic,” Vaccaro tells TEA. “We are scaling and need to hire a few C suite/VP level personnel that can lead each vertical within our Gamers First umbrella company.”

In case you are not familiar with G1, it was founded in December 2021 by former NFL safety Kenny Vaccaro (Tennessee Titans, New Orleans Saints), Hunter Swensson, and Cody Hendrix. The Austin-based esports organizations currently fields teams in Halo, Rocket League, and Trackmania, and serves as the official home of multiple content creators.

More importantly, G1 is best known as the organization that kept Women’s Carball League (WCB) alive. Kansas City Pioneers acquired WCB in late-2021 and helped grow it into a viable league for women to compete in a professional Rocket League circuit safely. While KCP managed to help grow the league, it also struggled to pay for it near the end of 2022, and in January it announced that it would be forced to pause Season 5 gameplay to find a buyer or secure some other type of funding. At the end of February, G1 announced that it had acquired the league for an undisclosed amount of money and had taken over for the 2023 season.