Caroline Wanga officially stepped down as president and CEO of Essence Ventures in March 2025.
Now, she is taking the company to court, alleging it damaged her reputation by failing to correct a false narrative about the “deeply criticized” 2025 Essence Festival of Culture.
Wanga filed a civil lawsuit against Essence in New York State Supreme Court on June 11.
The 12-page complaint says the former CEO took a health-related leave of absence in September 2024 and “had already separated from the Company” months before the 2025 festival, on the July 4 weekend in New Orleans.
Last year’s festival faced a host of problems, as previously reported. Among them were concerts that started hours late, technical difficulties, and lower-than-usual attendance. Seven months after the gathering, local news outlet Nola.com reported some vendors still had not been paid.
Essence announced Wanga’s departure in a press release on Aug. 25, 2025. The release described her as a “transformative leader of ESSENCE Ventures from June 2020 through the start of her leave in fall 2024.”
The lawsuit says the former CEO “chose to step down” four months before the festival to focus full-time on her WangaWoman LLC.
Per the lawsuit, Wanga and Essence “agreed” to delay news of her departure until after the festival, which ran from July 4-6, 2025.
The lawsuit describes last year’s gathering as “unsuccessful and deeply criticized by the public.”
Instead of taking responsibility, Wanga says Essence allowed her to be “blamed by the public for the failure of the festival,” causing her to face “significant backlash, including threats directed toward her and lies spread widely about her.”
“Ms. Wanga was not involved with the planning or execution of the festival in any way,” the complaint says.
Entertainment journalist Kathia Woods covered the festival for the Philadelphia Tribune and told Urban Hollywood 411 in July 2025, that the gathering suffered from “poor organization.”
“There’s no reason in year 30 that we’re still having technical issues,” Woods said.
Among the widely-reported problems, eight-time Grammy winner Lauryn Hill performed in a near-empty stadium because of massive delays, which festival organizers confirmed were not her fault.
R&B singer Stephanie Mills wrote an open letter to festival organizers on social media, saying her performance was “marred” by “technical difficulties.”
The festival also came under fire for accepting a corporate sponsorship from Target, despite boycotts against the retailer for rolling back its DEI programs.
The lawsuit says Wanga was unfairly blamed for the Target sponsorship because she used to work for the retail giant.
“Among the false and defamatory statements online relating to this sponsorship was that Ms. Wanga was ‘selling out’ the Black community in securing this sponsorship, and had done so solely due to her previous employment as an Officer at Target,” the lawsuit says.
There were also public complaints that the festival was pricing out small Black businesses, and moving away from its core mission of promoting African-American culture by embracing a Pan-African focus.
“Many members of the African American community were upset by this shift. They expressed frustration in losing an event historically meant to celebrate Black Americans,” the complaint reads.
The lawsuit says Wanga was unfairly accused of “erasing Black American heritage” from the festival because she is originally from Kenya.
According to the complaint, she repeatedly asked executives at Essence Ventures and parent company, Sundial Media, to “clarify that she was not involved with the festival.”
“Despite these requests, when Essence Ventures announced her departure in August 2025, it intentionally omitted these key facts,” the lawsuit says.
Because of the backlash, Wanga insists her reputation was battered and her company WangaWoman suffered “$249,250 in lost revenue.”
Wanga is represented by Larry Schaefer of Minneapolis-based Schaefer Halleen LLC. She has requested a jury trial, and is seeking unspecified punitive damages, compensatory damages, interest on any compensatory damages, and attorneys’ fees.
Richelieu Dennis, executive vice chairman of Sundial Media Group, purchased the Essence brand from Time Warner in 2018, returning Essence magazine to Black ownership. The haircare mogul is also African and was born in Liberia.
In response to Wanga’s lawsuit, Essence Ventures and Sundial Media released a statement on June 12, calling the allegations in the complaint “baseless.”
“ESSENCE Ventures and Sundial Media & Technology Group are aware of the complaint filed by Caroline Wanga, which contain allegations that are patently false. The core allegation in the complaint is that ESSENCE failed to correct that Ms. Wanga was not directly involved in ESSENCE Festival of Culture 2025. However, notwithstanding any obligation to make such a statement, Essence made clear that she was not involved,” the statement says.
The company describes the festival as “larger than any one person,” and says Essence will continue its tradition of delivering an event for Black women this July.
“The timing of this complaint a few weeks before our festival is not lost on us. We have supported Caroline on her journey and the facts will reflect that. In short, the complaint is without merit and ESSENCE will defend itself against these baseless claims,” the statement concludes.
The 2026 Essence Fest is scheduled to take place July 3-5 at the Superdome and Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans.
You can read the full lawsuit here.
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