- Gwyneth Paltrow’s lifestyle brand Goop conducted another round of layoffs, Business Insider learned.
- The company let go 18% of its staff in September.
- After a series of pivots, Goop says it is now focusing on beauty, fashion, and food.
Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop has conducted its second round of layoffs in as many months, Business Insider has learned.
The layoffs, which accounted for less than 6% of staff, affected multiple divisions, including the beauty, programming, engineering, and creative departments. Goop confirmed the layoffs to BI.
The goal of the reduction is to “optimize operational efficiency and revenue growth in our key verticals of beauty and fashion,” a Goop spokesperson told BI.
It’s the second known round of cuts this year. In September, the newsletter-turned-e-commerce site laid off 18% of its 216-person staff, or about 40 people. The cuts included at least one member of the company’s C-suite, CMO Lauren Johnston.
Just last month, actor and Goop founder and CEO Paltrow told WWD that, following the first round of layoffs, Goop was “back in growth mode.”
The company said those layoffs were part of a larger restructuring, adding that the company — which has at times sold everything from vitamins to home goods — was doubling down on beauty, food, and fashion.
Earlier this year, the company hired consultants from a company called WestView to streamline business, the company told BI.
Goop launched 16 years ago, has garnered fans and critics alike with its viral products — like a candle advertised as smelling like Paltrow’s orgasm — and health advice. It has also attracted money: The company has raised more than $140 million from blue-chip firms like NEA, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and Felix Capital and was most recently valued at $433 million, per PitchBook.
Paltrow has said that accepting that much in venture funding hasn’t always been easy.
“You start fielding questions about scale, especially if you’ve taken VC money. And that’s where I think it can be very, very difficult. And frankly, where I’ve made mistakes along the way,” she said at a Forbes conference in September.
Since it began as a newsletter, the company has pivoted several times. It’s had a publishing imprint, magazine, and Netflix series, which are now seemingly paused or defunct. At times, it has focused on wellness and sold vitamin regimens — only one of those is still available for purchase — and has teased an expansion into home furnishings.
Now, the company is prioritizing its fashion, beauty, and food businesses, it told WWD in September. These include in-house clothing brand G. Label, beauty lines Goop Beauty and Good Clean Goop, and delivery-only Goop Kitchen restaurants.
The brand has gone through personnel changes before. In 2021, BI reported that at least 140 employees, including high-level executives, had left the company in a two-year period.
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