Nothing sells like bad news. Certainly not Under Armour sportswear or Blue Apron meal kit subscriptions. Both companies have found themselves grasping at solvency as sales dip, taking investor confidence and stock prices with it. But neither has given up the ghost yet. Both are trimming the fat and giving it another go.
Meanwhile, businesses aren’t the only ones struggling with financial solvency. Many of America’s poorest can add overdraft fees to the list of strains on their already-thin bank accounts.
Here’s who’s hurting the most this week, by the numbers:
36 percent | Stock slide experienced by Under Armour this year as, one by one, the big box athletic stores that carried the brand are going bankrupt and folding.
280 | Lower-level employees laid off by Under Armour as the sportswear brand shifts strategies and brings in new blood at the top.
35 percent | Stock slide suffered by Blue Apron since its IPO last month. Shares dipped another 5.4 percent to $5.89 after co-founder Matt Wadiak’s announcement that he would be stepping down as COO.
24 percent | Blue Apron employees who will be affected by the company’s decision to close its Jersey City facility and move 1,270 jobs to a larger site in Linden, New Jersey, slated to open later this year. That’s not necessarily layoffs — Jersey City employees will have the option to continue working with the company at its new site in Linden, and more than half have decided to do so.
$15 billion | The amount U.S. consumers paid in overdraft fees in 2016, showing that businesses aren’t the only ones struggling financially. The poorest Americans — with low account balances and little margin for error — were hit the hardest, paying around $450 per year in overdraft fees.