Maplebear Inc., the company that does business as Instacart, announced that its board of directors approved workforce layoffs, according to a Feb. 9 report it filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The same day, Instacart announced revenue growth for its fiscal fourth quarter and year ended Dec. 31.

The SEC filing shows that Instacart’s plan “includes a reduction of approximately 250 employees, representing approximately 7% of the company’s global workforce as of January 31, 2024, with most of these reductions expected to occur by March 31, 2024.”

Instacart layoffs and executive-level changes

Instacart estimates the restructuring plan will cost $19 million to $24 million in non-recurring charges, according to the SEC filing. That’s predominantly tied to “cash expenditures for employee transition and severance payments and employee benefits.” Although Instacart will have to incur expenses this year due to accounting rules, it said $17 million to $22 million of the expenses will affect cash flow in the future.

In the same filing, Instacart noted that chief operating officer Asha Sharma informed the company of her decision to resign, effective March 1. Instacart said in the filing that it does not plan to hire or appoint a new COO “at this time.”

CEO Fidji Simo said in a Feb. 13 earnings call with investors that its chief technology officer (Varouj Chitilian) and chief architect (JJ Zhuang) are also departing the company. Simo said the company is “taking the opportunity to streamline my management team and create more autonomous teams with all the levers they need to execute on our critical initiatives.”

She added that the company will look for a new CTO. As with the COO role, though, it does not expect to backfill the chief architect position, she said.

Instacart Q4 results

Simo said on the call that Instacart fulfillment speed improved in Q4, adding that the fill rate increased for the sixth consecutive quarter. Fill rate is the percentage of customer orders that a business can ship right away, without any backorders, stockouts, or missed sales.

Instacart grew orders 5% year over year in Q4 to reach 70.1 million. Gross transaction volume (GTV) also increased year over year, up 7% to $7.89 billion. Instacart also announced $803 million in total Q4 revenue. That’s a 6% year-over-year increase that represents 10.2% of GTV.

Instacart transaction revenue grew 6% year over year to reach $560 million. That represents 7.1% of GTV for the quarter.

Instacart 2023 full-year results

For the full year, Instacart grew orders to 269.2 million, a 3% year-over-year increase. Instacart GTV grew 5% over 2022 to reach $30.32 billion.

Meanwhile, Instacart total revenue in 2023 grew 19% year over year, reaching $3.04 billion. That represents 10% of GTV. Transaction revenue represented 7.2% of GTV, as it grew 20% year over year to reach $2.17 billion.

Recent Instacart announcements

Instacart will partner with grocery chain Hy-Vee to offer same-day delivery, Hy-Vee announced days before Instacart’s earnings call. Hy-Vee will benefit from the nearly 600,000 shoppers in Instacart’s network that can pick up, pack and deliver orders, Instacart said.

Meanwhile, Instacart announced it will be available for Whole Foods deliveries in select parts of Canada.

“Our mission at Instacart is to create a world where everyone has access to the food they love, and working with beloved retailers like Whole Foods Market helps us make that mission a reality,” Chris Rogers, chief business officer at Instacart, had said in a released statement.

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