Back in 2009 I queried a marketing contact at Overstock.com about possibly interviewing Patrick Byrne, the CEO. “I’ll ask him,” the contact replied.
An hour or two later, I received an email — from Patrick Byrne. He was available.
The dialog and subsequent interview are memorable. He involved no public relations personnel — unusual for a publicly traded company — and required no preparation.
“Should I send my questions in advance?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “Ask whatever you want.”
We published the interview in December of that year. I learned he held a Stanford PhD and funded the construction of schools worldwide. He shared in the interview helpful ecommerce tips on holiday selling and shipping and was generous with his time, utterly unpretentious.
None of that squared with the Patrick Byrne years afterward, the one embroiled in nonstop investor lawsuits, who reportedly romanced a Russian spy, and, yes, the man scheming in the Trump Oval Office.
Nonetheless, I think of Byrne and the years-ago interview when Overstock makes the news, such as last year when it purchased Bed Bath & Beyond, the retail chain, out of bankruptcy.
Byrne had long since left the company. His successors evidently sought a post-pandemic reset and paid $21 million for whatever was left of the storied retailer. Thus began a disastrous chain of events.
- June 2023: Purchased Bed Bath & Beyond.
- October 2023: Rebranded “Overstock.com” to “BedBathAndBeyond.com.” Changed the corporate name to “Beyond, Inc.” and switched from the Nasdaq to the New York Stock Exchange with a new trading symbol of “BYON.”
- February 2024: Posted 2023 net losses of $307.8 million, a company record, on revenue of $1.56 billion, a 20% year-over-year decline.
- March 2024: Relaunched Overstock.com.
Q2 2024 Financials
By June 30, Beyond, Inc. operated two ecommerce sites, BedBathAndBeyond.com (housewares) and Overstock.com (discounted goods).
The Q2 financial statements do not segregate each site’s performance. Combined, the sites generated roughly $398 million of revenue for the quarter, a 5.7% decline from the previous year, with a net loss of approximately $43 million, a 42% improvement from the Q2 2023 loss of $74 million.
Beyond, Inc. acquired another bankrupt brand, Zulily, for $4.5 million in cash in March. Look for that retailer of women’s and children’s apparel to relaunch this fall, having ceased operations in December.
Beyond, Inc.’s stock price on August 22 was $11.02, a five-year low.
