(Bloomberg) -- Gopuff has fired hundreds of staff members, coming after earlier rounds of job cuts this year, as the rapid delivery startup struggles to stem its cash burn in a slowing economy.
The Philadelphia-based company has recently laid off as many as 250 employees, according to people familiar with the matter. The job reductions primarily affected customer service staff, which included a mix of full-time and temporary employees, the people said, asking not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly. Gopuff had about 15,000 employees as of March.
Some employees who were let go described the firings as chaotic and said they weren’t given a warning before access to internal systems like Slack, email, and human resources portals were revoked, even as they were still working shifts. Other full-time employees were told severance packages were “coming soon.”
Closely held Gopuff is navigating an uncertain economic environment while facing increasing competition from rivals like DoorDash Inc. In March, the company laid off 3% of its global workforce and further reduced headcount in July, letting go of about 1,500 people. Over the summer, Gopuff also shuttered 76 warehouses, roughly 12% of its network, across the US to consolidate its footprint in some cities.
In a statement, Gopuff said the latest layoffs had been planned as part of the July restructuring. “The most recent impacts to the customer service team were part of this reorganization which we’ve been implementing for the last three months,” a spokeswoman said.
While Gopuff executives had intended to eliminate the roles months ago, employees were not notified until recently. In an email sent to some employees last week, vice president of people Karen Fascenda said “the delayed action was to ensure we maintain business continuity.” Fascenda added that the job cuts would “help to optimize for the company’s long-term success” and that “there are no plans for incremental layoffs.”
(Updates with company statement in penultimate paragraph.)
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