Wayfair Inc. said it’s cutting about 1,750 jobs, or 10% of its workforce.
The company said Jan. 20 the reductions would include about 18% of corporate employees in an effort to eliminate management layers and become more agile. The moves follow a hiring freeze announced in May.
Wayfair ranks No. 7 in the Top 1000, Digital Commerce 360’s database of the largest North American online retailers.
Effect of Wayfair job cuts
Wayfair’s cost-cutting initiatives will amount to more than $1.4 billion in annualized cost actions, the company said. It is expected to help it break even on an adjusted earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization basis earlier in 2023, as the first step toward positive free cash flow. The stock rose 5% in early New York trading at 7:25 a.m.
“Although difficult, these are important decisions to get back to our 20-year roots as a focused, lean company premised on high ambitions and great execution,” CEO Niraj Shah said in the statement. “In hindsight, similar to our technology peers, we scaled our spend too quickly over the last few years.”
The online home-goods retailer has struggled with sales declining for more than a year after revenue boomed during the early stages of the pandemic, when U.S. shoppers spent on fixing up their houses. Wayfair’s shares have fallen about 75% in the past 12 months.
The Wayfair job cuts add to the pain for workers in the tech and ecommerce sectors. Earlier on Jan. 20, Alphabet Inc. announced it would cut 12,000 jobs globally, following similar moves this week from Amazon.com Inc. and Microsoft Corp., which began eliminating 28,000 jobs between them.
The retailer ranks No. 7 in the 2022 Digital Commerce 360 Top 1000.
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