In January 2024 CapitalizeVC invested in symphonie's pre-seed round. We are excited and humbled to welcome them to what we're doing at symphonie to enable e-commerce brands to do better everywhere they sell. Today more than ever brand's need a better, smarter way to make better decisions.
In Q3 2023 Red Lobster lost $11M in a single quarter by not understanding 1) its costs, and 2) customer demand; and by focusing on top-line revenue instead of maximizing its contribution margin. There is a popular misconception that only small brands make this type of mistake but Red Lobster provided us with a "real-life" anecdote disproving that misconception. Let's dive into the details!
Benitago trumpeted a $325M series A raise in Nov 2021. By Nov 2023 they filed for bankruptcy. Jon Derkits - a fellow ex-Amazon alumni - published a deep dive into Benitago's bankruptcy worth reading. Two details caught our eyes from Jon's summary: 1) they had 29 legal entities; and 2) 92 people with only 12 employees and 80 contractors at the time they went bankrupt. Let's talk about these two points a bit more.