Latest / Best of Business / Chris Keall: NZ Herald senior business writer on the rise and fall of Allbirds

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Chris Keall: NZ Herald senior business writer on the rise and fall of Allbirds · Best of Business

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  Speaker 2: New Zealand's own All Birds, the sustainable footwear company that
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  Speaker 2: was founded by the all White Tim Brown, has sold.
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  Speaker 2: It's had a few tough years, went for about sixty
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  Speaker 2: eight million dollars, was once valued at seven billion. The
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  Speaker 2: Herald's senior business writer Chris Keel has watched its rise
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  Speaker 2: and fall and joins us Now, Hi, Chris, are you
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  Speaker 2: surprised that the value it went for.
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  Speaker 3: No, It's been in a lot of trouble for a
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  Speaker 3: couple of years. It's unfortunately almost been a textbook case
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  Speaker 3: of things going.
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  Speaker 2: Wrong in what way?
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  Speaker 3: I guess the overarching thing is that it's never been
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  Speaker 3: able to make a profit. It's making sustainable shoes from
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  Speaker 3: New Zealand, Marino Will and recycled materials, but not at
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  Speaker 3: a sustainable price, or at least a commercially sustainable price.
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  Speaker 3: It's just lost money. Quarter after Cord and September Cord,
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  Speaker 3: which turns out it will be the last one it'll
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  Speaker 3: ever report made a net loss of twenty million of
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  Speaker 3: revenue of thirty three million, So just not a sustainable
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  Speaker 3: business model.
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  Speaker 2: Is part of the problem, Like, could this potentially have
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  Speaker 2: worked if they had more types of shoes, more styles
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  Speaker 2: that were more fashionable, because it seems that was also
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  Speaker 2: part of the problem.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, there was a sort of a disaster front page
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  Speaker 3: Wall Street Journal story for them in twenty twenty three.
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  Speaker 3: It said All Birds were no longer the ITCHU. Once
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  Speaker 3: upon a time, there's Barack Obama wearing them. Caught side,
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  Speaker 3: there's Leonardo DiCaprio, all very celebrity snapped wearing them. But
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  Speaker 3: Wall Street Journal said fashion had moved on, and it
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  Speaker 3: quoted some pretty cruel tweets. One said the all Birds
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  Speaker 3: were now sweet pants for your feet. Another one called
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  Speaker 3: them crocs for tech bros. And also another sort of
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  Speaker 3: quite damaging part of that article said, when you tried
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  Speaker 3: to go running in your all Birds in the rain,
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  Speaker 3: they just fell apart.
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  Speaker 2: Was that was that? I just wondered if that was
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  Speaker 2: actually true? Have you got a pair of all Birds?
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  Speaker 3: I did buy Some said try running in the rain.
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  Speaker 3: Well I didn't. I had a colleague he did all
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  Speaker 3: his all birds that were that wet will smell didn't
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  Speaker 3: smell too good. But I mean I interviewed Tim Brown
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  Speaker 3: a couple of years ago when he was on a
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  Speaker 3: trip home to visit his parents and we met at
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  Speaker 3: All Birds store on the Auckland border front. And at
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  Speaker 3: the time he was trying to launch the All Birds
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  Speaker 3: tree Runners. So obviously eggs or White and Phoenix Midfield
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  Speaker 3: are very fat guy, so they were All Birds for
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  Speaker 3: quite hardcore runners. And I was looking at the people
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  Speaker 3: in the shop behind us, and they looked more like
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  Speaker 3: they'd come off the adjoining cruise ship that the people
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  Speaker 3: who are actually buying All Birds were more middle aged people.
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  Speaker 3: Even had an email today from Brian Fellow, the Heralds
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  Speaker 3: retired economics Colum must He said he had bought six pairs.
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  Speaker 3: He just about to buy another and it's just quite
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  Speaker 3: a demographic from.
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  Speaker 2: What Kevin Millne loved them as well. He had he
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  Speaker 2: had a thousand different different types, so it was for
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  Speaker 2: a certain certain age bracket. Ay is part of the
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  Speaker 2: problem also, it fel it feels like once they kind
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  Speaker 2: of became cool, they just really expanded very quickly into
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  Speaker 2: bricks and mortar, and a lot of bricks and mortar.
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  Speaker 2: Did they did they expand too fast?
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  Speaker 1: Maybe?
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  Speaker 3: I think they did. Unfortunately they're They're bricks and mortar
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  Speaker 3: expansion are currentcided with COVID, so that was bad timing,
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  Speaker 3: but they never managed to to sort of recover from that.
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  Speaker 3: They tried to expand into ath leisure, where, according to
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  Speaker 3: the Wall Street Journal, all Birds staff realized that a
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  Speaker 3: whole shipment of leaguings were actually see through, so they
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  Speaker 3: had to be dumped. They just didn't work out, and
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  Speaker 3: so then they tried to do a retro reboot of
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  Speaker 3: their original shows, but that didn't work out either.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, just sounds like everything. Hey, listen, Thank
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  Speaker 2: you very much, Chris, I really appreciate your time. Chris Keel,
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  Speaker 2: the Herald Senior Business writing.
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