After bleak spring, Blue Apron signs on 200,000 new customers
Earlier this spring, things looked bleak for meal-kit company Blue Apron. After closing its Arlingon, Texas facility in February (and laying off all 240 employees who worked there), the company’s stock was trading at less than $3 per share amid rumors of a sale. But the Covid-19 pandemic appears to have reversed the company’s fortunes, CNBC reports. Since mid-April, demand for the meal-by-mail service has surged: With earnings up 66 percent, and over 200,000 new customers signed on, the company’s stock price has quadrupled. But is this sudden growth a knee-jerk reaction to the uncertainty of the moment, or does it signal a longer-term shift in our willingness to cook with home-delivered ingredients? As is the case so often now, it’s still too soon to tell.
