On-demand Grocery App Gorillas Lays Off Half Its Office Workforce (theverge.com) 43
Grocery app Gorillas, which promises to deliver goods in as quickly as 10 minutes, is laying off half of its office staff. From a report: In a press release, the company said it was letting go of roughly 300 employees from a "global office workforce" of 600. (This workforce also includes roughly 14,400 staff working in warehouse and as delivery drivers.) The company is also planning to tighten its focus on five markets that account for 90 percent of its revenue: the UK, US, Germany, France, and the Netherlands. The company also operates in four other European markets -- Spain, Denmark, Italy, and Belgium -- where it says it is "looking at all possible strategic options for the Gorillas brand." That might mean pulling out of these markets, but Gorillas tells The Verge nothing has been decided yet.
More expensive to borrow money (Score:5, Insightful)
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If they can even grow explosively with more capital. Without pandemic restrictions, there's probably a net reduction in how many people want to shop for fresh meat and produce on an app. Some people will always love the idea of grocery delivery, but they're probably shrinking. Nobody will continue to invest if throwing money at it won't even cause it to grow.
That doesn't help (Score:2)
Of course this being modern capitalism anything but endless double digit growth is cause for alarm and the CEOs must slit their bellies in shame. Seriously, I'm no communist or even a socialist but we do need a healthier system.
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Higher interest rates coupled with reduced available capital (net investment dollars are moving from riskier to safer money due to boomers retiring) are making the "grow explosively fast at all costs" startup model less possible. Maybe Amazon, Facebook, Uber, etc., was a once in a lifetime thing...
Some of those companies were started by established millionaires, so let's not overlook that fact.
As far as expectations, most people would have liked to see market crashes and recessions being a once-in-a-lifetime thing too. Today, we expect it, because Greed N. Corruption bought off every authority to remain unpunished even when they DO cause crashes.
Oh wait. I almost forgot. It's even worse. They're Too Big To Fail. Forever now.
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You don't know me or how I would rule, so you really don't know if I could be far better for you and everyone else. But let's just say you would be challenged to do worse right now. Like breaking-laws-of-physics challenged. It's already mind-warping trying to fathom how the hell current leaders got there.
Would I start with government? Probably not. But certainly RobinH can understand how Greed hates the revolting stench of fresh-baked unions, which seems to be wafting down many more Wall Street corners
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Unions also exist to shift a bit more power into the hands of the actual people that keep a business running.
Fire the CEO, and one of the CxOs or GMs will take their place. It could be executed within the same hour if the business and/or Board is organized well enough, and with minimal or no impact to ongoing operations.
Firing the entire union, will guarantee a considerably different impact and much longer recovery time, if fate and luck bestow the business with survival after such a move. The social medi
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Re: More expensive to borrow money (Score:3)
What we are missing are good new ideas and solid management teams. On demand delivery is old school at this point, and the stronger, leaner, enterprises have taken over the market.
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Higher interest rates coupled with reduced available capital (net investment dollars are moving from riskier to safer money due to boomers retiring) are making the "grow explosively fast at all costs" startup model less possible. Maybe Amazon, Facebook, Uber, etc., was a once in a lifetime thing. You can't just start a business that only intends to grow without any thought of profitability in the foreseeable future, at least not anymore.
Erm... is Facebook making any money? Uber certainly isn't.
The idea of a unicorn startup was the brainfart of a retarded venture capitalist who honestly thought that funding 20 crazy ideas would result in one of them paying megabucks. It was never going to work. We're seeing that now.
Amazon is the exception and not much of one. They cornered a market that didn't exist but now they're having to compete with everyone else who had the advantage of watching where Amazon succeeded without having to endure w
Oh my, that's a lot of gorillas. (Score:4, Funny)
Don't worry (Score:4, Funny)
Don't worry, they'll go back to their old job, posing for NFTs.
Re: Don't worry (Score:1)
You're thinking of apes. Different species altogether.
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They must be causing all the monkey pox.
fuel prices are to high for gig work on demand vs (Score:2)
fuel prices are to high for gig work on demand vs routes / full day planing.
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Most of them are in the larger cities in Europe, and don't use gasoline cars but electric cars and (electric) bicycles.
So fuel cost is not an actual issue.
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The cost of fuel in the EU is about 4 times as high as in the US. In comparison the cost of electricity is pretty irrelevant, and does rise, but is still insignificant in comparison to fuel prices.
Pinkslips arrive in 10 minutes (Score:1)
then again, they usually do
Well they were probably terrible (Score:2)
Gorillas aren't really suited to an office environment. The furniture replacement costs alone...
I have to admit (Score:2)
This news about layoffs is the first time I've ever heard anything about this company.
Agreed (Score:2)
I'm in the UK and 30 miles from central London and I've never heard of them until today.
That's probably a good reason why they are likely to go TITSUP very soon.
Far more nuiscance overall than value for a few (Score:4, Interesting)
Nuisance and protest: how should the dark stores in the city continue?
April 14, 2022, 7 a.m. Edited April 14, 2022, 7:50 a.m. By Mirjam Eeken
On Tuesday, Albert Heijn announced that it was going to expand flash delivery in Amsterdam, especially now that the existing flash delivery services are not allowed to expand. What about the dark stores in the city?
High demand, but also noisy delivery guys, bicycles on the sidewalk and delivery that goes on day and night: flash delivery services keep the city busy. At the end of January, the municipality decided not to allow new dark stores in the city for a year. Albert Heijn is filling the gap and will deliver groceries at lightning speed from next week in collaboration with Deliveroo and Thuisbezorgd. In the meantime, the municipality is still looking for a solution to the dark store problem.
Complaints
After several complaints from residents from, among others, De Pijp and West, the municipality was full at the end of January. Flash delivery services continued to be a nuisance in the area and enforcement did not improve. The municipality then decided to ban the arrival of new dark stores for a year by means of a preparatory decision.
At the moment there are no specific regulations for dark stores, because it is a relatively new concept. The rules for, for example, a post office or a shop are clear, but a dark store is not yet covered by existing legislation.
That is why the municipality is now developing a new zoning plan for the dark stores. In this way she hopes to be able to keep dark stores out of shopping centers in the city center in the future. But of those locations, flash delivery services, which promise to deliver the groceries to your home within 10 minutes, have to get it right. providers
Amsterdam currently has 31 dark stores from four providers: Gorillas, Getir, Zapp and Flink. The delivery service is in great demand, but the bases with their bicycle traffic and taped windows also cause nuisance. A Zapp branch on Fagelstraat was even told to close. There were persistent nuisance complaints from local residents and the dark store was robbed twice in a short period of time. Zapp tries to prevent the closure through a lawsuit.
New dark stores
AT5/NH Amsterdam received several reports in recent weeks from concerned residents that, despite the ban, flash delivery services appeared to be opening a new dark store in their neighborhood. Refrigerators and desks were brought in at Admiraal de Ruijterweg (Flink) and Linnaeusstraat (Getir), among others. According to the flash delivery services, this concerns buildings that they had already rented before the preparation decision came into effect. They would now only furnish the buildings and not use them. To date, none of the branches have opened.
Future
The future of flash delivery services in the city is uncertain. A spokesperson for the municipality says it is still in consultation with the four companies. There will be another meeting at the end of the month.
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They're calling delivery services "dark stores"? How sensationalist.
Re:Far more nuiscance overall than value for a few (Score:4, Interesting)
Those same retail locations were often prior shoe repair/ tailors, dry cleaners, bakeries, bike sales/repair shops, just off the top off my head). Those kind of shops were absolutely not dark, because they were actively involved in the community along with their neighbors and regular customers.
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Those retail spaces were available because retail businesses that were in them went under, because retail is becoming less and less viable overall. The people who own them are going to want someone to rent the spaces. There are empty retail spaces all over most of the world as retail businesses are killed off by internet businesses and mail order.
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Nobody needed this anyway.... (Score:2)
This is yet another of MANY examples of business startup ideas that are doomed to failure, because they attempt to solve a problem nobody really had.
Show me ANYBODY who really has a need to pay a premium price for delivery of an order of a product because they "need to have it in the next 10 minutes" (or for that matter, even the next 30 or 45 minutes). If you find yourself in this situation, it's because of poor planning -- and you should fix that core problem instead of spending more than necessary as a
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This is yet another of MANY examples of business startup ideas that are doomed to failure, because they attempt to solve a problem nobody really had.
Show me ANYBODY who really has a need to pay a premium price for delivery of an order of a product because they "need to have it in the next 10 minutes" (or for that matter, even the next 30 or 45 minutes). If you find yourself in this situation, it's because of poor planning -- and you should fix that core problem instead of spending more than necessary as a "quick fix" of getting somebody to rush the item to your doorstep.
Yeah, I'll get right on creating a time machine right after my party guests leave so that I can fix the core problem yesterday and have the stuff I wanted for my guests now. Or... I can pay a premium for speedy delivery as a one time expense to solve the immediate problem And also work on the core problem for the future. Both ways solve the two issues, but only one stays within the bounds of reality.
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Yeah, I'll get right on creating a time machine right after my party guests leave so that I can fix the core problem yesterday and have the stuff I wanted for my guests now. Or... I can pay a premium for speedy delivery as a one time expense to solve the immediate problem And also work on the core problem for the future. Both ways solve the two issues, but only one stays within the bounds of reality.
How many parties are you hosting that need immediate delivery of groceries? It would need to be quite a lot to create a viable market for a business.
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"Oh no, my party, that I completely forgot about, is starting in 30 minutes!"
Or maybe he just likes to throw so many spontaneous parties he's lost all sense of time.
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People make store runs for party supplies all the time. I've done it, and it wasn't even my party.
Webvan? (Score:2)
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Good riddance (Score:1)
I wouldn't have a problem with the cyclist delivery in general, but, they seem to recruit people who don't know or care about cycling rules.
Their fat fuck delivery riders are abusing the cycle lanes with their powered vehicles.
Grocery delivery (Score:2)
Once again, not a tech business. Both grocery sales and delivery services are labor intensive, low margin businesses. This business will follow Ãoeber and GrubHub: it will never turn a profit.
More, these guys are facing regulatory problems. To enable fast drliveries, they have opened warehouses in residential areas. Zoning regulations may not cover this situation, but residents are...displeased with lots of big trucks making deliveries at all hours.