OfferUp lays off one-fifth of its workforce in cost-cutting move

Bellevue-based digital marketplace OfferUp is laying off 19% of its staff, a spokesperson confirmed to the Business Journal on Tuesday.

In an email to the company, OfferUp CEO Todd Dunlap said the company's headcount growth had outpaced its revenue growth, and the company realized by midyear it would miss its revenue growth projections. Despite having multiple years of runway, Dunlap said, OfferUp and its board decided the company's costs were getting in the way of achieving its goals.

"I want to acknowledge our colleagues who are leaving. They are valued contributors to OfferUp who had the misfortune to be in roles that are not required for our 2023 plans," Dunlap said in the email.

He also noted OfferUp needs to achieve goals such as significant user growth, significant revenue growth, profitability and expanding its market opportunity. Dunlap also said the company could benefit from more marketing, but that was hard to do given the company's costs. Laid-off employees will get at least eight weeks of severance, health care through January, access to career services and the ability to keep their OfferUp laptops.

OfferUp was founded in 2011. The company allows consumers to buy and sell goods like furniture, clothes, jewelry and cars. In September of last year, Dunlap said OfferUp had about 400 employees.

OfferUp is just the latest local tech "unicorn," or startup with a value of at least $1 billion, to lay off employees recently. Seattle-based freight network startup Convoy in October laid off employees for the second time this year. Seattle-based customer data startup Amperity in August laid off about 3% of its total headcount.

Dunlap took over as CEO in July 2021 from co-founder Nick Huzar, who became the chief product officer. Prior to OfferUp, Dunlap had spent nine years at Booking.com, where he was the North America head. He spent more than a decade at Microsoft before that.

"We have built a large and active marketplace that serves tens of millions of users every month, but we’re not yet at a revenue scale that allows us to thrive without continued growth," Dunlap said in his email to staff.