Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop is reportedly planning to cut about 20% of its workforce as it moves away from its image as a wellness and lifestyle brand and focuses on selling beauty products.
The company, which rose to fame with products like the “This Smells Like My Vagina” candle and psychic vampire repellent spray, has struggled to stay relevant since the actress launched Goop as a newsletter in 2008.
Group plans to cut 18% of its 216 employees and make “a number of redundancies” as part of a major restructuring effort. This was reported by fashion industry magazine WWD. Thursday.
According to Business Insider, the company will be shifting away from loss-making themes like wellness, particularly sexual wellness and travel, to focus on three key growth areas: beauty, fashion, and food.
“For a while, Goop tried to be known as a wellness company, selling all kinds of products and advice that people might consider weird or fringe. It was a fad. Fads don't last,” Herald PR CEO Judah Engelmeyer told The Post.
“I still think she's a huge star. I don't think she's slowing down. I just think it's because of the industry.”
The Post has reached out to Goop for comment.
The “Avengers” star and CEO has always targeted a high-end customer with her luxury skin-care brand, Goop, which sells products such as facial moisturizers for $100 a bottle.
The company has also begun to carve out a space for price-conscious shoppers, launching its good.clean.goop brand last year with products under $40 on Amazon and Target.
Goop's beauty products revenue grew 40% last year. According to WWDTotal revenue is expected to increase in 2023 and rise again this year, it added.
“It was a steep learning curve. It's a completely different business, but it's been a lot of fun,” Paltrow said about good.clean.goop in an interview with WWD in July.
Goop recently opened its sixth retail store in the Bay Area, further strengthening its focus on beauty brands, and also has two brick-and-mortar stores in the Los Angeles area, one each in New York City, Sag Harbor, N.Y., and Hawaii.
The company is also expanding Goop Kitchen, a Los Angeles-based food brand that delivers healthy meals to customers' doors.
The food delivery service has raised $15 million in funding from Uber co-founder and CloudKitchens CEO Travis Kalanick and others, valuing the brand at $90 million.
CloudKitchens founder Diego Berdakin has also invested in the Goop brand.
“Goop Kitchen launched with a cloud kitchen in Costa Mesa last year and achieved a payback period in less than three months,” Beldakin told WWD. “Simply put, this is the most impressive operator I've seen invest in online delivery in the last decade.”
Paltrow's brand has landed in hot water after encouraging readers to insert $66 jade and rose quartz stones into their vaginas to balance hormones and boost “feminine energy.”
Gynecologists have disputed claims about the eggs' benefits, instead finding that they can cause toxic shock syndrome.
Group He settled the lawsuit for $145,000. about “unsubstantiated” marketing claims in 2018.
