๐ฐOn this day in Consumer & Retail Sector in 1974, at 8:01 a.m. in a Troy, Ohio supermarket, a 10-pack of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit gum (67ยข) became the first retail item ever scanned with a UPC barcode. Modern retail data was born with a 10-pack of gum.
I've had access to Fable for a bit. A genuine jump in capability, I could feed it a 15 page design document for a project and it would work for 9+ hours and deliver terrific results.
But working with it is weird & weirder is coming
Lots of examples: https://t.co/HptkYunBzr
๐ฐ On this day in 1902, the first Horn & Hardart Automat opened at 818 Chestnut Street in Philadelphia: a coin-operated "waiterless restaurant" where a nickel in the slot bought a hot meal, pioneering American fast food and vending machines. https://t.co/FpmOp2rRi2
Former SPAC Waldencast ($WALD) just sold Obagi Medical to Bridgepoint for $460m โ barely half the $858m it paid four years ago. The founders are going with it. Here's the full wreckage (and one decent outcome). ๐งต
The Milk Makeup stub is actually the interesting story now for $WALD. Clean balance sheet, founder back in charge, one focused brand, and potentially interesting bite-sized acquisition for a strategic if the team can clean up the overhead and execute from here on out.
Likely Zodiac would need to materially up both price and financing to clear the "superior proposal" bar.
Fun fact: they had offered $1.25 back in January. Do they have the capital and conviction to get back there?
More details:
https://t.co/iWA62VlnBL
The itty-bitty takeover battle for big & tall retailer Destination XL ($DXLG): A perennial underperformer - peaks of $8 to troughs under $1 for 20 years, sales stuck at $400-500m since 2008, despite the ever-widening waistband of the American consumer.
Dec 1 market cap: $50m.
$DXLG Board verdict on May 26: inadequate, highly conditional, subject to financing. Only $10m committed equity and only an indicative debt term sheet.
Kontoor Brands $KTB swaps its Lee jeans for Helly Hansen gear. KTB announced the sale of its Lee business to Authentic Brands for $750m plus an earnout of up to $250m. This follows the acquisition of Helly Hansen in 2025 for $900m. A good trade? Details: https://t.co/aOdFZUa6CW
$PBH continues on its acquisition spree with the purchase of Australian therapeutic skincare company #LaCorium Health for $150m, paying an implied 3.8x LTM Revenue and 12.5x LTM EBITDA "after synergies". This is after its $1b acquisition of Breath Right in March.
Pssst, @Paul_Hastings, there's a mistake / typo in your @UniFirst_Corp merger proxy statement with @CintasCorp . Hint: Background of the Merger section.
https://t.co/0sXCnPfXc4