How Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop Empire is 'Crumbling': Staff Lay-Offs, Flatlining Sales, Takeover Bid Rumors — and a World 'Sick of Silly Wellness'
Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop empire is in the soup as sales of 'Smells Like My Vagina' candles and other wacky wellness brands begin slow down as shoppers shun her store.
Nov. 7 2024, Published 8:20 a.m. ET
Hollywood A-lister Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop lifestyle brand is in the soup as it seems shoppers have had enough of $75 This Smells Like My Vagina candles and $15,000 gold-plated sex toys.
She recently pulled the plug on a physical Goop store in London after Brits failed to show her wacky wellness cures and pricey homewares and presents any love, RadarOnline can reveal. She lost around $2m in the process.
Now the firm, which derives most of its revenue from global online sales, is struggling to keep its healthy glow.
In 2018, New York Times said Goop was worth $250 million. That came just a decade after Paltrow launched Goop as a newsletter with recipes for banana muffins and turkey ragu.
Paltrow recently pulled the plug on a physical Goop store in London after Brits failed to show her wacky wellness cures and pricey homewares and presents any love.
Earlier this month it was reported that 18 per cent of staff had been let go.
One report — denied by Goop — said overall sales had plateaued since 2021, despite the continuing progress of the $5.6 trillion wellness industry that Paltrow sent stratospheric.
A much-hyped budget beauty line for Target, and Amazon is also said to have floundered.
Her clothing line, G Label, has never captured women’s imagination like The Row, despite sharing the same tasteful, neutral "quiet luxury" aesthetic that has made Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen’s label so popular and successful.
Earlier this month it was reported that 18 per cent of Goop staff had been let go.
Paltrow determinedly wore her brand throughout her high profile 2023 trial that saw her take the stand for eight days defending herself against a $300,000 lawsuit after a ski crash in Utah.
"We’ve been through a lot," Paltrow, 51, admitted at a Forbes summit last week, before adding: "Some years, we’ve doubled in growth. Some years, we are flat. Some years, we’re down, then we’re back up."
Wellness watchers have declared that the company is in crisis, and the woman steering the ship is seeking a way through the storm and possibly courting buyers to take over the firm.
Paltrow "was an absolute genius to commodify wellness the way Goop did", said Beth McGroarty, vice-president of research at the Global Wellness Institute.
Paltrow admitted at a ‘Forbes’ summit: 'Some years, we’ve doubled in growth. Some years, we are flat. Some years, we’re down, then we’re back up.’
"She relentlessly monetised it. Think about forest bathing — going for a walk in the woods. She’ll turn it into a scented candle. Or rest — she’ll sell pyjamas. It was massively successful, and she made it feel like all PR was good PR. The more crazy the claims seemed, the better."
McGroarty sees 2019 as the “high water mark and then came Covid, which McGroarty said fundamentally disrupted Goop’s business model.
"Coming out of the pandemic, people are more interested in science and data rather than beliefs," she said.
"The biggest trend in wellness right now is probably longevity clinics: doctors testing your body, and working with medicine and science. It’s a totally different mindset."
Wellness watchers have declared that Goop is in crisis, and the woman steering the ship is reportedly seeking a way through the storm and possibly courting buyers to take over the firm.
And Gen Z are pushing back against that Goop decade of high-spend, high-pressure wellness.
They want low-spend wellness: emotional wellness, intense communities, social sauna bathhouses with DJs.
Goop’s budget-friendly line of products, launched in October last year, is said to have only exacerbated the issue.
Paltrow said the range, all priced at less than $40, was a way of making Goop lotions and potions available to a wider market. But the attempted rebrand of a traditionally aspirational offering may not have gone to plan.
Outside company walls, Goop is also up against serious competition in the clean beauty and lifestyle arena.
Target ranks the line as a "bottom 15" product, Puck reported.
Outside company walls, Goop is also up against serious competition in the clean beauty and lifestyle area. Jessica Alba’s Honest company, offering homeware and beauty, was founded in 2012 and valued at $1.7 billion just three years later — although its worth has since dropped to about $230 million.
Selena Gomez’s Rare Beauty line is being touted as a $2 billion brand, although bankers are yet to find a buyer willing to pay that price. Goop said the company's sales increased in 2023 and were on track to do so again in 2024.
The company added that beauty revenue was up 40 per cent last year, and the clothes range G Label was up 51 per cent this year, compared with the same period a year earlier.
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Paltrow said: ‘The more I lean in to the true heart of what I want to do, the more the company succeeds.’
"I have a friend who says: when you’re whacking through the path, you get all scratched up," Paltrow said last week.
"The truth is: the best thing to do is embrace your niche. Just do what you do, embrace who you are. The more I lean in to the true heart of what I want to do, the more the company succeeds. I used to think 'man, there’s this company that started way after us and look at them now' — and they are no longer there. I’m proud we’re still alive and kicking."
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