Blue Apron Holdings Inc (NYSE: APRN) IPO in late
June couldn't
have come at a worse time.
The company sells to consumers a food delivery kit, but it's far from alone in the space and faces competition from several
other startups. An even bigger threat is the possibility of Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) leveraging its proposed acquisition of Whole Foods Market, Inc.
(NASDAQ: WFM) to conquer the space given its much bigger
scale and resources.
The mere possibility of Amazon entering the meal kit delivery space has kept Blue
Apron's stock notably below its $10 offering price. The stock was down another 10 percent Monday morning and dipped below $7.00
per share for the first time ever as investor concerns may have been confirmed.
Amazon Files For Trademark
A subsidiary of Amazon, Amazon Technologies Inc., signaled in a trademark application on July 6 that it may soon sell "prepared
food kits composed of meat, poultry, fish, seafood, fruit and/or and [sic] vegetables...ready for cooking and assembly as a meal,"
TheStreet
reported.
If that isn't sufficient evidence that Amazon is preparing to enter the space, the product's tagline reads: "We do the prep. You
be the chef."
Shortly after the opening bell, Blue Apron was trading at $6.52, down 11.3 percent.
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