DoorDash is eliminating about 1,250 corporate jobs, or about 6% of its workforce, saying it hired too many people when delivery demand surged during the COVID-19 pandemic.
CEO Tony Xu said in a message to employees Wednesday that DoorDash was undersized before the pandemic and sped up hiring to catch up with its growth.
“Most of our investments are paying off, and while we’ve always been disciplined in how we have managed our business and operational metrics, we were not as rigorous as we should have been in managing our team growth,” Xu wrote. “That’s on me. As a result, operating expenses grew quickly.”
The company is seeking to lower its operating costs, Xu said, but it was unable to bring spending in line without job cuts.
“This hard reality ultimately led me to make this painful decision to reduce our team size,” Xu said.