GoKawiilThe Etsy Inc. headquarters in the Brooklyn borough of New York, US, on Tuesday, June 25, 2024.
Etsy said Wednesday it's laying off about 220 employees, or roughly 12% of its workforce, as the online marketplace looks to simplify its organizational structure and innovate faster in an increasingly competitive e-commerce industry.
Etsy CEO Kruti Patel Goyal, who took over the helm at the beginning of this year, told staffers in a memo that the job cuts will position the company for "building the organization we believe Etsy needs for the future."
Most of the cuts will impact Etsy's product and engineering teams, the company said.
The layoffs, which were announced alongside Etsy's second-quarter earnings results, aren't a cost-cutting effort, but are intended to help the company "lean in during a period of strong momentum so that we can move faster and execute with even greater focus," Etsy wrote in its letter to shareholders.
The cuts also weren't driven by artificial intelligence, an Etsy spokesperson said.
"You've heard me say that our first priority was to get the business growing again," Patel Goyal wrote in the staff memo. "Our ultimate goal, though, has always been to take Etsy to the next level of growth so we can fully deliver on our mission and our potential. We are now at the point where we need to make that shift - to build the team, culture, and organization that will make that possible."