Waitr Holdings, the Louisiana company that acquired Minneapolis-based online restaurant-delivery service Bite Squad a year ago, is making deep cuts to its Twin Cities staff as the last of Bite Squad’s old leaders depart.
The Star Tribune reports that Waitr (NASDAQ: WTRH) this week laid off most of its operations and dispatch workers at its Minneapolis office, with total job cuts numbering about 30, according to an unnamed ex-employee. Waitr told the paper it wouldn’t close the site outright but wanted to concentrate its leadership in Lake Charles, La.
The company also said it would exit some of its markets, but didn’t give details on which ones. In a statement, Waitr said, “In order to position ourselves for the future, we’ve made the unfortunate but necessary decision to close a subset of low-performing markets and reduce our workforce.”
Waitr paid about $321 million in cash and stock last December to acquire Bite Squad — one of the biggest tech exits for the Twin Cities in recent years — creating a restaurant-delivery business that operated in a combined 700 markets. At the time, Waitr said that it would split management between the two cities.
RELATED: Here’s who is cashing in on Bite Squad’s big exit
But Bite Squad’s top executives have left the business in recent months. Co-founder Kian Salehi exited in the spring, and Kyle Hale, a Bite Squad leader who became chief operating officer at Waitr after the merger, left in September. CFO Jeff Yurecko, another Bite Squad alum, left last month.
Baton Rouge newspaper The Advocate notes that there’s been a lot of turnover among Waitr’s leadership as well, as the company struggles with growth outlook. The company, which once projected 2019 revenue of $250 million, has cut that estimate to $215 million and its stock — which traded at $14 in the spring — has fallen below $1.
Other food-delivery services are also facing some headwinds; Chicago food delivery giant GrubHub (NYSE: GRUB) saw its stock tank by 43 percent in one day last week after it cut its own projections.