Key points:
- Beyond Meat confirms further job cuts
- The company also lowered guidance
- Beyond Meat shares are down over 8%
Beyond Meat (NASDAQ: BYND) announced Friday that it is making a strategic shift, including job cuts and lowering guidance, to reduce expenses and prioritise sustainable growth after reporting a weaker outlook.
The company said that approximately 200 workers would be cut from the company's current staff, accounting for 19% of the workforce.
The plant-based meat company anticipates that the workforce reduction would result in one-time cash charges of around $4 million, primarily made up of severance and notice period payments, employee benefits, and incidental costs.
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“To manage through the current environment and realize the opportunity ahead, we are significantly reducing expenses and sharpening our focus on a set of key growth priorities,” said Beyond Meat President and CEO Ethan Brown.
Furthermore, Beyond Meat is also reducing its sales projections. The group now expects third-quarter net revenues of approximately $82 million, a 23% decrease from the prior year.
Additionally, full-year revenues are anticipated to be in the range of approximately $400 million to $425 million, representing a 14% to 9% decrease compared to 2021. In contrast, the prior projection expected net revenues between $470 million and $520 million.
In its statement, Beyond Meat “believes it has been negatively impacted by ongoing softness in the plant-based meat category overall, especially in the refrigerated subsegment, and by the impact of increased competition.”
The company expects that, in aggregate, over the next twelve months, the strategic shift will result in approximately $27 million in cash operating expense savings and an additional approximately $12 million in non-cash savings, related to previously granted, unvested stock-based compensation.
Demand for Beyond Meat products has fallen significantly in the past year, with plant-based meat product pricing being a potential factor in falling demand. The company's stock has tumbled this year and has declined 8.93% premarket, adding to its 77.5% fall this year.
