The Ledger
Every statement that passed quotation and attribution checks. Mix any filter with any other: certainty 1/5, debate potential 5/5, or both at once.
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Allbirds Co-Founder: Amazon Profits Off Knockoffs Targeting Allbirds Search Terms
“If you look at how Amazon does, even when you're not selling on their channel, enough people have typed in all birds on amazon.com such that there is a lot of knockoffs and other, perhaps you would call it similar looking products. That are now sold through Am…”
Joey Zwillinger: Allbirds will refocus on its core active lifestyle category
“And so that is the core of where we started the brand. And that's where we're going to bring everything back to with a really sharp clarity for the consumer. And the potential when we do that is going to be pretty significant. So I think in, in, in part, you'r…”
Zwillinger: Remote Work Is Impossible for Physical Product Companies
“The conception of what productivity means is far too narrow. And particularly in an industry like mine, where Creativity and physical products are central to what we do that not being together is is impossible.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds will be cash flow and EBITDA profitable in 2025
“What we've said to the market, we've got to be pretty consistent with that on your podcast as well. Is, is that will be cashflow and EBITDA profitable in 20, 25.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds will consider going private if market valuation gap persists
“If along that journey the public markets don't see the value that we're creating, and there's a big gap between the value that we are creating and what the enterprise value is of the company, then I think it's prudent to consider all options. And we have a boa…”
Zwillinger: Allbirds leads multi-billion-dollar competitors in tech infrastructure
“Something that we have in spades relative to our competition, no matter what their size, even if they're many, many billion dollars in size, we have we are leading in terms of the infrastructure and the tech enablement that we've been able to bring into the bu…”
Zwillinger: Allbirds was not structured to capitalize on pandemic demand
“And I think we were in the unfortunate position of not being structured in a way that, that could capitalize exactly on the dramatic change that had happened in that world.”
Zwillinger: Less than 15% of Americans know Allbirds exists
“We still have less than 15% aided brand awareness, meaning only 15% of the US population knows that all birds exist.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds is a product company first, not tech or fashion
“We are a product company first and foremost, and we need to tell amazing stories around those products. That, that is what we are. And we happen to exist In a category where style and fashion is incredibly important. That, that is how I think about the company…”
Nicole Quinn: Allbirds physical retail stores reach profitability in months
“Clearly all birds have just raised around to focus on retail expansion, and you can see that these retail stores are profitable in a matter of months. Often they're cost-neutral marketing channels.”
Zwillinger: Big Brands Cannot Effectively Market Sustainable Material Innovations B2B
“When you're trying to sell from a business to business perspective, even if it's a great product, it's a good price. And it has this overwhelmingly positive message around sustainability. The big brands just don't understand how to take that and market it effe…”
Zwillinger: Allbirds aspires to Tesla's strategy of product performance over sustainability
“I'd say a company that, that is done a really nice job in an area that I take a lot of inspiration from, would probably be Tesla. Which is around performance and quality of a product and an aesthetic and a beauty that delivers in and of itself. And the free gi…”
Zwillinger: Quiet luxury trend will be a tailwind for Allbirds
“And I think if you think about what's happened from over the last couple of years with this, like maximal build in the trends of how shoe companies have been coming to the consumer marketplace and the fact that now quiet luxury is really coming back and people…”
Joey Zwillinger: Allbirds' wholesale expansion will drive consumer awareness and adoption
“As we brought in now into the wholesale marketplace in the U S and eventually in, in the international geos that we serve, we're going to grow awareness. We're going to reach a lot more consumers and They're going to fall in love just like the early, early gro…”
Joey Zwillinger Sold Zero Shares at Allbirds IPO and Minimal Shares Since
“So I've sold extraordinarily little at the IPO. I sold nothing. And then after that I've sold incredibly little.”
Zwillinger: Incumbent brands couldn't effectively position green technology products
“And so it was a Sisyphean exercise for me where I realized that while the technology existed, the consumers wanted it. It was, there's no compromise offering was there for the taking and brands could not position it correctly.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds can achieve $1B+ in sales by focusing on core shoes
“And if we just get really good, really, really good at just a few shoes, we can be a billion dollars in sales and go well beyond that.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds sales declined in 2023 for first time ever
“And as a result, the sales have declined this year for the first time in the history of the company.”
Allbirds Requires Core Product and Marketing Teams In-Office Four Days
“And most of the people who are closest to the central aspects of product creation and design and marketing are coming in for four days a week.”
Zwillinger: Multiple footwear and apparel companies asked to acquire Allbirds
“We've had a number of companies in the footwear space and the kind of ecosystem of apparel and footwear more broadly come to us and ask us if we were interested in selling.”
Zwillinger denies ever asking Allbirds investors to sell their shares
“We've, I've never told someone to sell or not sell.”
Zwillinger: Domain expertise should be a reference book, not a playbook
“I often talk about with our leaders that what they bring in, Is deeply needed and deeply respected, but we need to think about it as a reference book, not a playbook.”
Warby Parker, Harry's, and Allbirds founders shared Vasen's Wharton class
“If you look at my warden class alone, like the founders of Warby Parker, Harry's, Allbirds all came out of that single class.”
Eurie Kim: Allbirds Generated $1 Million in Its First Month
“Allbirds, which is not in our portfolio, but another really fast-growing brand, I think they did a million dollars in their first month of business.”
Zwillinger: Low Oil Prices Force Renewable Material Companies Direct-To-Consumer
“Particularly in this environment where petroleum is really cheap right now, it puts a lot of pressure on a lot of different brands that rely on renewable materials and something that's more expensive. So really, you have to go downstream to connect with the co…”
Zwillinger: Allbirds is a material innovator, not a fashion company
“So we view ourselves much more like an innovator than we do a shoe company or a fashion company, or we don't think we're ourselves really as a fashion company at all.”
Zwillinger: E-commerce discount pop-ups cheapen brand and customer experience
“You say, do you want a pop up screen on your internet site that says get 10% off for, if you enter your email, you know what that message says to you. It says you're about to get spammed by my company. In exchange for 10% off, it cheapens the experience, so we…”
Stebbings: Allbirds was acquired by Almex for $39 million
“It was acquired by Almex for thirty-nine million dollars.”
Stebbings: Allbirds went public at $3.8B and dropped to $120M
“It went public at 3.8 billion, and it's now one hundred and twenty million.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds halted retail expansion and cut marketing spending
“So we stopped all store growth. We pulled back on some of the wholesale expansion and we then pulled back Probably, I don't know exactly the exact number, but high teens marketing in terms of year over year comparisons on the dollars we spent.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds footwear lineup was 100% casual lifestyle shoes in 2019
“We didn't have an athletic positioning at all at that time. And, you know, we were a hundred percent of a casual lifestyle shoe offering in 2019.”
Zwillinger: Footwear industry was 70-80% wholesale before Allbirds
“Because the whole industry is structured like this before we started was, you know, 70, sometimes 80% wholesale distributed.”
Zwillinger: Allbirds generates close to $300 million in annual revenue
“We now have a brand that's, you know, close to three hundred million dollars in revenue.”
Stebbings: Allbirds went public at $3.75B and dropped to $127M
“Company went public at 3.75 billion. Today it's sitting at 127.”
Kaden: Maveron's Allbirds investment scaled with high capital efficiency
“There are companies that are scaling even in direct-to-consumer brands, and they're scaling with capital efficiency, you know, invested in Allbirds at Maveron. It's going really well, and they're extremely capital efficient, and customers love it, and they com…”