OAN’s James Meyers
10:08 AM – Tuesday, December 12, 2023
Toy maker company Hasbro is laying off around 1,100 employees after struggling to hit sales numbers heading into the holiday shopping season.
CEO Chris Cocks announced the almost 20% layoff of the company’s workforce in a Monday memo to employees, after slashing almost 800 jobs earlier this year.
According to a Hasbro fact sheet, the company had close to 6,300 employees as of earlier this year.
Additionally, shares of the company dropped over 4% in extended trading on Monday.
“We anticipated the first three quarters to be challenging, particularly in Toys, where the market is coming off historic, pandemic-driven highs,” Cocks said in the memo. “While we have made some important progress across our organization, the headwinds we saw through the first nine months of the year have continued into Holiday and are likely to persist into 2024.
The move comes after Hasbro warned in October that revenue would continue to drop towards the end of the year. The toy company cut its soft full-year outlook, projecting a 13% to 15% revenue decline for the year.
Furthermore, popular toy brands such as My Little Pony, Transformer and Nerf dropped 18% in the October quarterly reporting’s due to “softer category trends.”
Hasbro competitor Mattel also warned of lower sales numbers. However, Mattel’s stock is up 6% as of Monday, thanks to the success at the box office of the movie “Barbie.”
Retailers could be in for a rough holiday season, as toys saw lower discounts for consumers, compared to discounts from last year.
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