Blue Apron (NASDAQ:APRN) stock doubled in price after taking a buyout offer from Marc Lore’s Wonder Group.
Shares in the meal kit company rose to $12.83 each overnight from their $5.49 per share close. This still leaves the market capitalization at just $83 million. Wonder is offering $13 per share.
Ending the Horror
Blue Apron has been a horrible stock to own since its 2017 initial public offering (IPO). It suffered two reverse splits, one in 2019 and the other this last June. An investor who bought 100 shares when it started trading and kept the investment now has barely one-half a share.
Lore founded several e-commerce companies in the last decade, most notably Jet.com, which he sold Jet to Walmart (NYSE:WMT) in 2016. He then spent five years as its head of U.S. e-commerce.
Wonder has had its own problems since Lore launched it in 2018 while he was still with Walmart. Originally founded as a network of food trucks, it’s now a “ghost kitchen” with its own supply chain. It had a value of $3.5 billion after its last funding round in 2022. Ghost kitchens are a product of the Covid-19 epidemic, essentially restaurant kitchens specializing in pick-up and delivery.
Wonder currently has four locations but hopes to end the year with 10. Lore has been adding executives from Blackstone (NYSE:BLK) and Sweetgreen (NYSE:SG).
Blue Apron transferred its fulfillment centers and equipment to Fresh Realm, which delivers fresh meals to retailers, in June. Fresh Realm now owns 16.5% of Blue Apron. Blue Apron was founded in 2012 and had its heyday in the mid-2010s when it advertised widely on podcasts as a way for new cooks to make restaurant-quality meals at home without waste.
APRN Stock: What Happens Next?
The ghost kitchen idea, like food trucks and meal kits before it, has lost luster since the Covid-19 pandemic. What’s left of Blue Apron may be going from the frying pan to the fire. Fortunately for investors, it’s Lore’s fire now.
As of this writing, Dana Blankenhorn did not hold (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
