Blue Apron turns profit as more Americans cook at home during coronavirus pandemic
Meal-kit maker forecasts net sales growth in remainder of the year
Blue Apron CEO and President Linda Kozlowski argues people will continue to cook at home more even when coronavirus is over.
Blue Apron Holdings Inc. swung to a first-quarter profit as the company raked in sales from Americans cooking at home during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The New York-based meal-kit maker earned $1.1 million, or 8 cents per share, as revenue rose 10 percent from a year ago to $131 million. Wall Street analysts surveyed by Refinitiv were anticipating a 45-cent per-share loss on revenue of $102.9 million.
“Our progress with our strategic growth plan, together with the increase in demand we saw from the COVID-19 pandemic, resulted in solid and continued year-over-year growth in key customer metrics,” CEO Linda Findley Kozlowski said in a statement. We expect to see “year-over-year net revenue growth in the second half of 2020.”
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Blue Apron added 20,000 customers during the three months through June, helping increase its order count by 389,000. The average order value increased to $60.88 as the number of orders per customer rose to 5.4. That brought the average revenue per customer to $331, up 22 percent from the first quarter.
The company had $45.4 million in cash and cash equivalents at the end of June.
Blue Apron’s board of directors continues to explore strategic alternatives to maximize shareholder value.
Looking ahead, management sees third-quarter revenue climbing 13 percent year-over-year to $112 million and a net loss of no more than $18 million.
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Blue Apron shares rose 114 percent this year through Tuesday, outperforming the S&P 500’s 0.38 percent loss.