The CQ | Table22's Series A, Wonder's Big New Hire, & OURA's Third Acquisition
Plus the Forerunner Team's Must-Reads of the Week
The CQ is Forerunner’s weekly newsletter rounding up the most pressing consumer news and analysis, plus some bonus musings from our investment team. Subscribe now to get the latest edition in your inbox every weekend.
October closed out the same way it started, with no shortage of portfolio milestones and momentum. In a market that continues to revolve around heightened pressure on unit economics and a need for resilience, these wins are the result of years of heads-down building that typically goes unnoticed.
Table22 closed its $11M series A round led by Lightspeed, as the company charges forward with empowering restaurants nationwide to grow their revenues through their most loyal fans without burdening their existing operations. Says one restaurant owner, “It's like having another week of revenue in a month and I didn't have to pay any additional costs."
Wonder, Marc Lore’s new company aiming to scale excellent quality food, made a big hire: Amazon exec Tony Hoggett. While it’s true that Silicon Valley has tried to scale great food in different ways before without it ever really panning out, leading investors to stray from the opportunity — and that restaurant delivery is so saturated with big leaders, the market appears not worth entering — sometimes, a new team comes along with the sheer ambition and vision to knock down those conventional beliefs. Wonder stands to truly shake up the category. Welcome, Tony!
OURA has acquired Sparta Sciences, marking its third acquisition in three years. Sparta’s primary offering is the health platform Trinsic, which tracks health vitals for enterprise clients. Sparta’s technology will be integrated into OURA’s emerging, fast-growth B2B offering, which serves a range of sophisticated enterprises and institutions, including a recent deal with the Department of Defense.
Here’s to an equally eventful November!
What We’re Talking About on Slack:
The U.S. economy grew at a 2.8% rate in the third quarter, but the October jobs report was uglier than expected. For the jobs report, hurricanes and striking workers held down employment — yet even excluding those effects, the report brought some warning signs for the job market. This economic growth, though slightly down from 3% in the second quarter, was driven by strong consumer spending, which increased at a 3.7% rate. Both of these measurements are being watched with a microscope, but for now, we have the lowest unemployment rate (4.1%) heading into a presidential election since 2000, with economic growth signaling no recession in sight.
U.S. hiring in ADP data rises to fastest pace in more than a year, with private payrolls increasing by 233,000 in October, surpassing all estimates in a Bloomberg survey. Education, health services, trade, and transportation sectors experienced significant job gains, while manufacturing saw a decline. Wage growth slowed, with job changers seeing a 6.2% pay increase and stayers receiving a 4.6% rise.
They used to be ahead in the American economy. Now they’ve fallen behind. The New York Times takes a look at the economic decline of white men without college degrees in the U.S. over the past 40 years. In 1980, the relative income of white men working without a college degree was 7% higher than the average worker. But today, even as their inflation-adjusted income has remained relatively flat, they’ve fallen well below the average income. This shift reflects broader changes in the economy, moving from manufacturing jobs to higher-paying roles in services and technology, which have left many blue-collar workers feeling marginalized as their status and sense of worth have diminished along with their incomes. “The shifting economy also undermined the pride of blue-collar men that they could be of use, to their families, their communities, and the country.”
Wealthier Americans are paying millions to age in luxury campuses, complete with housekeeping, valet parking, and high-end restaurants. In these life plan communities, residents start in an independent living apartment and transfer to nursing care as they need higher levels of care. Entrance fees average between $100,000 and $400,000 and can go as high as $7 million, with monthly fees averaging about $4,800. Many residents were motivated by their own experiences with their aging parents because they don’t want to be a burden to their children, plus the life plan communities offer peace of mind and a supportive social network. “It’s a gift to our kids,” says one resident.
Even households earning over $150,000 a year are living paycheck to paycheck. New analysis from Bank of America shows one in five households are living paycheck to paycheck, spending over 95% of income on necessities like food, electric bills, childcare, and rent. “When families hit a certain income threshold, all that ‘necessity spending’ ends up relatively higher, often outpacing their salary. Namely, ‘higher-income households may have bought larger, more expensive homes and consequently have bigger mortgages.’” The trend of financial insecurity increases with age, particularly among baby boomers and Gen X, the latter having the highest share of paycheck-to-paycheck households still in the workforce.
The Atlantic asks: Can corporate greed really explain inflation? Ernie Tedeschi, the former chief economist for the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers, challenges the “greedflation” narrative that corporate greed is primarily responsible for rising grocery prices. When you look at grocery inflation cumulatively over the pandemic, there was 23.5% grocery inflation from the end of 2019 to the beginning of 2024, meanwhile non-grocery inflation was 17.2%. “‘Markups can, at the very best, explain just a quarter of why grocery prices rose so much,’ he says, explaining that greedflation is an oversimplification and that there are several other factors contributing to the broader inflationary environment.”
The end of corporate climbing: A recent survey found that 42% of U.S. respondents don’t want a promotion because they are happy where they are. And Gen Z respondents were more likely than millennials or Gen Xers to agree with the statement "I don't want career progression." This shift is perplexing for employers who once relied on career advancement to motivate employees. In an effort to bring employees back to the office, Dell executives threatened promotion ineligibility if workers continued to WFH, yet nearly half of employees decided to remain remote. Many workers, particularly from younger generations, say they don’t want management positions due to the longer hours, fewer opportunities to do meaningful work, and because a bigger salary may make them more vulnerable to layoffs.
Meta is reportedly working on its own AI-powered search engine to reduce its reliance on Google and Microsoft. This new search engine will integrate AI-generated summaries of current events into the Meta AI chatbot available on Instagram and Facebook. The company is also focusing on enhancing its location data to compete with Google Maps. Recently, Meta secured a multi-year partnership with Reuters to incorporate its news articles into chatbot responses.
Inflation has cooled, but Americans are still seething over prices. Despite pay increases and a stable economy, many are struggling with the perception that their wages are not keeping up with the cost of living. According to a recent Wall Street Journal survey, three-quarters of respondents believe costs for everyday goods and services outpaced household income in the past year. Research shows that people “carry scars that can long influence how they spend and save” and even when they get a raise during times of inflation, people attribute that to their job performance, not a cost-of-living increase. “This contributes to the dislike of inflation and the feeling that it erodes your living standards.”
AI assistants are now blabbing embarrassing work secrets. Corporate assistants have traditionally managed sensitive company information, but AI tools like Otter.ai are increasingly taking over these tasks, often without the same level of discretion. Instances have occurred where automated transcriptions of recorded meetings included private side conversations that happened while one party was muted or logged off, leading to broken deals or just plain awkwardness. “I think it’s a big issue because the technology is proliferating so fast, and people haven’t really internalized how invasive it is…the combination of constant recording and AI-powered transcription erodes our privacy at work and opens us up to lawsuits, retaliation, and leaked secrets.”
Portfolio Highlights:
Pie CEO Andy Dunn speaks at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 about building a company while protecting your mental health.
WWD features Chime’s survey research on social media’s impact on consumer spending, including quotes from Janelle Sallenave, Chime’s chief spending officer.
Ritual Founder and CEO Katerina Markov Schneider visits the The Kara Goldin Show podcast to talk about the brand’s mission and how she got her start.
WWD lists Glossier as one of the 15 biggest brands by engagement on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.
Axios and TechCrunch cover Oura’s acquisition of movement data platform Sparta Science.
Jobs of the Week:
Head of Finance at Fay, the business-in-a-box platform for nutritionists that’s scaling in-network nutrition care for consumers
Growth Marketing Manager at Topline Pro, the Shopify for home services industry
Head of Creative at OURA, the company reimagining how consumers understand their sleep and overall health
Creator Marketing Manager at Stan, the all-in-one creator store enabling anyone to make money for themself
There are ~698 other jobs currently available at portfolio companies, check ‘em out