Instacart Beats Q1 Forecast as Orders Rise 9%
Grubhub Gold Days, Line Man Wongnai IPO nears, Motional cuts and delays
If you ordered some groceries on Instacart over the past three months, evidently you weren’t alone… the supermarket-heavy 3PD just logged a meaty quarter! Plus, more insights on Grubhub’s latest promo, a new IPO out of Thailand and sad news from Motional.
This week’s edition is brought to you by Yoshi Mobility.
Today:
Instacart Hits 73M Orders in Q1
Grubhub Gold Days Return
Chart Time | ThaIPO for Line Man Wongnai
Motional Delays Commercial Launch
3PD | Instacart Beats Q1 Forecast As Orders Rise 9%
The Q1 earnings roll out continues… as Instacart drops financial results that handedly beat analyst expectations. GTV rose 11% YoY to $8.3 billion, orders were up 9% to 72.8 million, and total revenue climbed 8% to $820M for the quarter, coming in ahead of the $794.5M forecast. Advertising revenue — everyone’s favorite — climbed 9% to $217M, representing 2.6% of overall GTV. All together this made for Adjusted EBITDA of $198M and a GAAP gross profit of $614 million.
The Big Picture: CEO Fidji Simo is particularly excited about Instacart’s efforts to roll out more smart Caper Carts, as well as the company’s push into omnichannel experiences, thinking it gives IC a stickiness its 3PD competitors lack. But its collaboration, not competition, that seems to have most stock watchers interested, as more details of its new partnership with Uber dribble out. Evidently IC first approached Uber about the collab, with Dara and co drawn in by the appeal of Instacart’s affluent suburban customer base. We’re going to give a quick tut-tut to the ding dongs at The Verge who have completely misunderstood the finances of this team up; it’s not Instacart that pays Uber Eats for “the software” but rather UE will kick back an affiliate fee to for every restaurant order placed through IC.
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PROMOS | Grubhub Gold Days Return May 13 - June 9
Gold Days, Grubhub’s member appreciation month, is back, starting on Monday. This year each week has an overarching theme, starting with “Eyes on the Fries,” where GH is teaming up with Mickey D’s for free frenchies on orders of $15 and up. After that it’s “Road Trip Fuel,” featuring 7-Eleven, Taco Bell, KFC, Dunkin’, Pizza Hut and Sweetgreen (hope that road trip has plenty of bathroom breaks.) Week three, Picnic-Palooza, brings in Wendy’s, CVS, BWW, Jersey Mike’s, Panera, and Papa Johns. And to celebrate “national best friends day” on June 8th, the final week — “Bites with Your Bestie” — features savings at Chipotle, Popeyes, BK, Little Caesars, Arby’s and Chili’s.
The Big Picture: Evidently Gold Days bounces around the Julian calendar more than a Jewish holiday, since last year this esteemed occasion was in October. Back then it was five weeks (friggin’ inflation!) and saw a slightly different partner mix. Say goodbye to brands like Maggiano’s, Noodles & Co, Insomnia Cookies, Wawa and Sonic, while McDonald’s is new to the collab. Last winter also saw Uber Eats roll out an advent calendar’s amount of savings; will they too move their promo month forward in a bid to be a bit more like Amazon Prime Day?
CHART TIME | Line Man Wongnai Preps for IPO
Line Man Wongnai, the thai food delivery biggie, is prepping for an IPO in 2025. Co-Founder Yod Chinsupakul says it may go public in the U.S., in Bangkok, or perhaps even as a dual listing. Valued at over $1B, the company traces its roots as Wongnai back to 2010, before merging with Line Man, the Thai arm of Asia-spanning messaging / social app Line. Thailand looks to be a particularly good market for 3PD these days, as the order discount rate is coming in much lower (~35%) than in other Southeast Asian geos.
AV | Layoffs Rack Motional As Commercial Service Delayed
Talk about putting the “Motional” in emotional, our hearts go out to the many good folks we know at the Hyundai-backed AVer, which just went through a very large round of layoffs. While Motional was just freshly recapitalized with nearly half a bill of Hyundai bucks, the company has decided to preserve capital by delaying the launch of its commercial driverless service until 2026.
The Big Picture: While Motional’s been tooling around the streets of Vegas for about two years, its planned expansions had been coming rather slowly. Although the company announced plans to launch in LA in late 2022, data from the CA DMV shows little progress towards that goal. For example, In 2023, Waymo logged 3.69 million miles statewide, with 1.19M of those being fully driverless. Motional only managed to rack up 16,000 miles, with zero of those being driverless. And while the company has touted plans to work with Uber Eats on a robo-delivery service as well, it’s hard to see a pathway to profitability on a kitted-out IONIQ 5 delivering a $10 burrito and a whole bunch of dead air…
A Few Good Links
Digital grocery sales hit $10B in April. CA bans hidden fees on July 1. McD’s investing hundreds of millions into digital marketing. Union Pacific debuts fast freight from LA to Chi. Erin go bragh — Amazon opening Irish portal in ‘25. BK celebrates 70th birthday with fatal looking cake. Dine Brands Global net income falls 36%. 7-Eleven launches new ad campaign. E-bike fires are an education issue.
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