Grove Collaborative

🚨 Announcement! 🚨 Grove is thrilled to announce a $15M investment from Volition Capital, led by investor and current member of our Board, Larry Cheng — reinforcing their confidence in Grove’s strategy, mission, and progress on our company’s turnaround journey over the last 12 months. Mr. Cheng’s background in internet and consumer investing, including in brands like Chewy and Gamestop, led him to begin working with Grove starting in August 2023, when Volition initially invested $10M in the company. Why did Larry invest in Grove (again)? “This investment is driven by my belief that the Grove management team has done an excellent job executing on the fundamentals of the business. The company has made major strides in profitability and has been Adjusted EBITDA positive for the preceding four consecutive quarters. With our investment and the planned pay off of the remainder of the term debt, the balance sheet will be stronger. And I believe the pieces are in place to enable a return to top line revenue growth in the coming quarters. All of this has been accomplished while substantially improving Grove’s offering to better and more consistently delight customers.” We’re eager to continue our work to become the platform for conscientious consumers to purchase planet-friendly and wallet-friendly products, and this update instills confidence that we’re on the right path. Read more about the announcement:

As an ecommerce retailer, we’ve been a digital-first company since our inception. We developed a best in class experience for our customers to explore, learn about, and purchase everyday sustainable essentials for every room in their home for over a decade. And as Grove grew, our customers and our website changed with us to keep up with ecommerce trends that soon became the norm. Today we’re excited to announce a major transition in our technology stack from our own homegrown solutions to industry-leading partnerships with Shopify, Ordergroove, and Tapcart. Working with these leaders will enable us to: * Lean into Grove’s points of differentiation on sustainability initiatives, merchandising, and product selection instead of maintaining standard ecommerce functionality. * Stay more current with evolving industry trends and consumer expectations while unlocking sitewide flexibility and scale to enable growth. * Improve acquisition, conversion, and lifetime customer value through solutions provided by Shopify, scaling recurring revenue through enhanced subscriber experiences and incentives with Ordergroove, and making the management and experience of our mobile experience more streamlined through Tapcart. * Become even more meaningful in the lives of our customers. We at Grove operate as a Collaborative because our partners have helped power our journey and the pursuit of our sustainability mission throughout our history. And we’re excited to expand our partnerships with our tech stack replatforming to propel us into the next phase of Grove’s transformation. Learn more about the announcement in Retail TouchPoints exclusive by Nicole Silberstein featuring Grove CTO and Co-founder Chris Clark.

This past week, one of our longest tenured employees at our Pennsylvania fulfillment center, Dre, retired - and our team gave him a proper send off with a Machine Train. At Grove, we love to celebrate progress and milestones, especially for the incredible employees that make our mission and everyday work possible. Congrats on your retirement, Dre, and thank you for the incredible nearly 10 years (!!!) of being part of Team Grove!

At Grove, we believe it is industry's responsibility to meaningfully address the plastic crisis instead of passing off the burden to consumers. This also means that employers have a responsibility to reduce the environmental impact of their organizations and influence employee behaviors and purchasing decisions. In July, the largest employer in the United States and the largest buyer of consumer goods in the world - the U.S. federal government - announced a commitment to phase out the purchasing of single-use plastics from food service operations, events, and packaging by 2027, and from all federal operations by 2035. The announcement also pushed for tougher regulations on plastic manufacturers because of their contributions to greenhouse gas emissions due to 90% of plastics being made from fossil fuels. We applaud this move, which would represent the first significant action on the plastic crisis that could have real impact on reducing plastic waste, and look forward to supporting it and other initiatives that prioritize the environment. Read more about this update from Allyson Chiu at The Washington Post https://lnkd.in/g-ZpTJnD

Earlier this month, we launched our Beyond Plastic™ Impact Tracker to help our customers better understand their impact by shopping with Grove. Now customers can see how much plastic is avoided and recovered in each order through our site - but customers can also make an impact by choosing our Grove Co. products at brick and mortar retailers. 🎯 Did you know: You can find Grove Co. home essentials at all Target locations nationwide? 🤯 Did you know: In the last year, Grove Co. customers shopping at Target have helped to save 225,000 pounds of plastic from entering the environment? That's equivalent to 6,430,492 water bottles! 🌏 Did you know: Grove Co.'s products packaged in aluminum (which can be recycled over and over again) are a great small step in helping reduce single use plastic? We're proud to share Target's Impact Tracker results and work with an incredible retail partner that is committed to bringing sustainable everyday essentials to customers across the U.S. Learn more about your own impact by shopping with Grove: https://lnkd.in/gqR2YWQW

Happy World Conservation Day! We’re celebrating the protection of 188,000 acres of old-growth forests in Clayoquot Sound, British Columbia, Canada. This is a monumental recognition of First Nations’ leadership, supported by $40 million CAD from The Nature Conservancy and Nature United the world’s largest conservation organization and a huge step towards sustainable conservation for several reasons: - Protecting biodiversity by preserving vital ecosystems - Mitigating climate change through significant carbon sequestration - Supporting Indigenous stewardship for sustainable practices We love this progress and continue to support Indigenous stewardship and protect our planet through our partnership with The Nature Conservancy!

It's still Plastic Free July, which provides another opportunity to share tips and tricks for people to Go Beyond Plastic™! Our team member Ryan Zimmerman recently visited DC News Now’s Living Local DMV to empower viewers in the DC region to make impactful changes through their product choices. His recommendations included using refill systems instead of single-use products, opting for infinitely recyclable aluminum, glass, or paper packaging whenever possible, replacing plastic wrap with reusable containers and covers, and swapping in more sustainable laundry and personal care items to reduce plastic waste. Special thanks to Charis Gomez (Hanner) Ellen Meny and Bridget Curran for hosting us! Check out the segment here: https://lnkd.in/g7sTZ747

In 2021, Washington state passed the landmark and nationally precedent-setting climate law, the Climate Commitment Act (CCA). The CCA caps and reduces greenhouse gas pollution and reinvests revenue in critical climate projects focused on improving clean transportation options, increasing climate resilience in ecosystems and communities, and addressing issues of environmental justice and health inequity. However, on the ballot, this November in Washington is a voter initiative, I-2117, which would repeal the CCA and shift the burden of paying for the impacts of pollution back onto communities, workers, and families. We are speaking out against this initiative and are urging Washington state voters to vote “no” on I-2117. Within our partnership with The Nature Conservancy to support Indigenous-led conservation in the region, we have seen the benefit the CCA provides in supporting Tribal nations’ community, conservation, and climate goals. As an example, Washington state has provided $25 million in CCA funding to support one of our TNC partner priorities, supporting the Quinault Indian Nation to acquire 11,000 acres of forestland that can act as a natural climate solution. If the acquisition is realized, over 3 million additional metric tons of carbon could be stored across all Quinault Nation lands over the next 20 years. However, if Initiative 2117 passes, this funding would be lost along with the needed funding for countless other vital climate projects across the state, turning the clock back on climate action at a time when the world can’t afford inaction. Visit: https://no2117.com/

ICYMI: Last week we launched an exciting new and exclusive tool for Grove customers: the Beyond Plastic™ Impact Tracker. Our team designed this feature to better support our customers on their individual sustainability journeys by disclosing the amount of plastic avoided (by purchasing reduced plastic products) and plastic recovered (by collecting the equal weight of plastic sold on our site) in every single order. And since 2020, our Grove community has saved the equivalent of over 808 million standard water bottles worth of plastic. WOW! We're incredibly proud of this latest launch - which you might have seen as our Grove team members shared their own impacts in recent days. Check out our sustainability director Alexandra Bede’s post below about this new tool.

At Grove, we love to celebrate sustainable wins and lead with optimism when communicating with our customers. However, don't let our optimism fool you- we're acutely aware of the alarming global plastic crisis. Among 225 global companies with annual revenues exceeding $1 billion, none are effectively addressing or making measurable progress in reducing their plastic footprints. As plastic pollution escalates into a critical environmental concern, we are calling on these global leaders to take urgent action and reduce their plastic intensity (pounds of plastic per $100 of revenue) as a key strategy to decouple their growth from reliance on plastic. Our unwavering commitment is to help our customers turn off the plastic tap by avoiding the sale of plastic products in the first place, while also minimizing the impact of single-use plastic on the environment. We continue to disclose our plastic intensity quarterly, demonstrating our dedication to transparency and accountability in our sustainability efforts. Many thanks to As You Sow for issuing the annual Plastics Scorecard report and Elsa Wenzel on the GreenBiz Group team for writing on this existential problem. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/dxieM555