Uber and Lyft Are Leaving a Major U.S. Metro After City Council Bumps Up Drivers’ Minimum Wage

It might be more difficult to get around Minneapolis after Lyft and Uber say they are ready to exit the city.

On Thursday, the Minneapolis City Council voted to increase driver wages to the local minimum wage for the city, which is $15.57 per hour.

But that was too much for the ride-share companies, which are now threatening to leave the city due to the new minimum wage implementation which will force them to pay drivers a flat fee.

The decision comes after the City Council voted 10 to 3 to override a veto by the city’s mayor to instate a pay raise ordinance for drivers in the city.

“It should be done in an honest way that keeps the service affordable for riders,” Lyft said in a statement. “This ordinance makes our operations unsustainable, and as a result, we are shutting down operations in Minneapolis when the law takes effect on May 1.”

Uber issued a similar statement provided to local outlet Fox 9.

“We are disappointed the Council chose to ignore the data and kick Uber out of the Twin Cities, putting 10,000 people out of work and leaving many stranded,” the company said. “But we know that by working together with all stakeholders – drivers, riders and state leaders – we can achieve comprehensive statewide legislation that guarantees drivers a fair minimum wage, protects their independence and keeps rideshare affordable.”

Last month, Lyft became the first ride-share app to implement minimum pay for drivers by guaranteeing that drivers would take home a minimum of 70% of what riders pay, regardless of external fees.

“We think hopefully it will get more drivers driving for Lyft, but also just make the whole sector stronger,” Lyft CEO David Risher told Reuters at the time. “We have more drivers now than we’ve had, I think, since the middle of 2019. It’s strong and I tell you what, it’s getting even stronger.”

If Uber leaves Minneapolis, it will make the city the only U.S. metro area without Uber in the country.

Uber was up a whopping 140% year over year upon the news as of Friday morning. Lyft was up over 93% for the same period at the same time.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/uber-lyft-plan-to-leave-minneapolis-on-may-1/471259

Travis Kelce and Patrick Mahomes Are Opening a Restaurant in Homage to Their Football Careers

Kansas City Chiefs stars and Super Bowl LVIII Champions Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce now have another accolade to add to their list of achievements — restaurant owners.

On Thursday, the pair announced they are opening a steakhouse in downtown Kansas City called 1587 Prime, a combination of their jersey numbers 15 (Mahomes) and 87 (Kelce).

The restaurant is slated to open in the Lowes Hotel Kansas City in early 2025 in partnership with hospitality group Noble 33.

“Travis and I have become frequent visitors of Noble 33 restaurants in other cities, so it only made sense to bring something special to our own community in Kansas City,” Mahomes said in a release.

The establishment is set to have several private dining rooms — perfect for Kelce, Mahomes, and their teammates when they’re looking for a moment out of the spotlight — as well as a meat display, a giant chef’s kitchen, and “subtle nods to Patrick and Travis’ on-field accomplishments.”

^{A rendering of the 1587 Prime main dining area (Credit: Noble 33)}

The wine collection and menu list will be one of the largest in Missouri and will be specifically curated to complement the menu choices, according to the release.

“We are thrilled to partner with Patrick and Travis to help bring our collective vision to life with 1587 Prime,” said Mikey Tanha, co-founder of Noble 33. “This partnership represents a convergence of culinary artistry, athletic prowess, community enrichment, and unmatched hospitality.”

The Chiefs teammates dine out frequently, notably at Prime Social in Kansas City, where Kelce’s girlfriend, superstar musician Taylor Swift reportedly picked up the tab for everyone dining upstairs and on the rooftop during one of their dates.

Jury’s still out on whether or not Kelce will be paying for all of his patrons upon entering 1587.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/travis-kelce-patrick-mahomes-opening-kansas-city-steakhouse/471253

Dollar Tree Is Closing 1,000 Family Dollar Stores

Discount store Dollar Tree, the parent company of Family Dollar, announced that it would be closing nearly 1,000 stores across the country.

“We plan on closing approximately 600 Family Dollar stores in the first half of fiscal 2024,” Dollar Tree said in a Q4 2023 earnings report. “Additionally, approximately 370 Family Dollar and 30 Dollar Tree stores will close over the next several years at the end of each store’s current lease term.”

The chain did not disclose which stores would be shuttering but noted that the company made its decision after evaluating its portfolio for underperforming locations.

Family Dollar was acquired by Dollar Tree in 2015 in an estimated $8.5 billion deal.

The news comes after controversy for Family Dollar, which paid out $41.6 million in a plea agreement with the FDA last month after it was found that the chain had been storing cosmetics, drugs, and medical-related devices for years in an unsafe manner.

The company also settled for $1.35 million last summer after a class-action lawsuit of complaints from workers about hazardous working conditions in stores.

In a Q4 2023 earnings report, the company reported that its Dollar Tree branded chains saw a 6.3% increase in same-store net sales, while Family Dollar stores saw a 1.2% decrease in the same area.

“We finished the year strong, with fourth-quarter results reflecting positive traffic trends, market share gains, and adjusted margin improvement across both segments,” said Rick Dreiling, chairman and CEO of Dollar Tree, in a release. “While we are still in the early stages of our transformation journey, I am proud of what our team accomplished in 2023 and see a long runway of growth ahead of us.”

Dollar Tree was down just under 11% year over year as of Thursday afternoon.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/dollar-tree-to-shutter-1000-family-dollar-locations/471196

Under Armour Founder Kevin Plank Returns as CEO After Controversial Exit, Shares Plummet 12% Upon the News

Athletic and sporting goods brand Under Armour just announced a major shakeup as the company’s founder, Kevin Plank, has returned to his role as CEO. He replaces Stephanie Linnartz after she spent roughly one year in the position.

“On behalf of the full team, I want to thank Stephanie for her contributions to Under Armour. We deeply appreciate her hard work and dedication,” Plank said in a company statement. “Her prior experience leading major brands was instrumental in focusing our consumer strategy, including the launch of the U.S. loyalty program, UA Rewards. Her efforts have helped set us on the right path, and we wish her success in her future endeavors.”

Linnartz will remain at the company as an advisor through April 30 before fully departing, and Plank will assume his role as CEO beginning April 1.

Linnartz made the jump to the retail industry in 2023 after 25 years in hospitality, most recently being appointed as Global Chief Commercial Officer at Marriott. She was tapped for the role to help the struggling athleticwear brand, which included a three-year plan to focus on womenswear and athleisure and making changes to top leadership.

“I feel honored to have served as Under Armour’s President & CEO and worked with many incredible teammates who care deeply about the company’s purpose and mission,” Linnartz said. “We have a strong foundation in place for future growth and the company’s potential is limitless. I will continue to root for Under Armour’s success.”

Under Armour shares plummeted upon the announcement of Linnartz’s departure, dropping nearly 12% in stock valuation early Thursday, reportedly due to Plank’s controversial past.

Plank stepped down in 2020 after a bombshell Wall Street Journal report revealed that he had been seeking business advice from MSNBC anchor Stephanie Ruhle, including flying her on private jets with the company aircraft and reportedly taking her advice over the company’s management team.

Plank was replaced at the time by the former CEO of Aldo Group, Patrik Frisk, who announced his resignation in May 2022.

Under Armour had a slow holiday quarter in 2023, with a 6% decrease in North American revenue and a net income of $114.1 million quarterly (as compared with $121.6 million at the same time last year).

As of Thursday afternoon, Under Armour was still down nearly 11% in a 24-hour period.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/under-armour-founder-kevin-plank-returns-as-ceo-shares-drop/471191

AI Is Impacting Jobs. Here Are the Gigs Affected the Most, According to an Analysis of 5 Million Upwork Postings

AI replacing jobs isn’t a theoretical idea, new research suggests, but something that is happening — right now.

Henley Wing Chiu, a Queens, New York-based researcher at labor and hiring trend website Bloomberry, looked at five million data points to see which jobs AI is most likely to replace, and which jobs are already being replaced.

Chiu, who is also co-founder of content marketing platform BuzzSumo, took the 12 most popular freelancing job categories on Upwork, a freelancing hub, and tracked how postings changed from 30 days before ChatGPT’s public debut to February 2024.

He found that most job categories showed an increase in the number of postings, with three notable exceptions: writing, translation, and customer service.

Writing jobs declined by 33%, translation jobs declined by 19%, and customer service jobs declined by 16%, all from November 1, 2022, to February 14, 2024.

“I definitely expected writing jobs to decrease, as this is perhaps the most popular use case of ChatGPT, and that was reflected in the -33% decrease in writing jobs,” Chiu wrote.

He elaborated that the decline in customer service jobs wasn’t surprising either because of the rise of AI customer service chatbots.

Almost all other categories had job postings increase, with video editing/production jobs up the most by 39%. Graphic design, web design, accounting, sales, and web development freelance gig postings also increased.

Chiu stated in the report that he decided to analyze freelance jobs instead of full-time or part-time jobs because the freelance market was the most likely to see AI impact first.

He gave a few explanations of the data: Generative AI tools could be good enough now to replace writing tasks, but not yet up to par for quality results in tasks like generating images or videos. However, that could change as OpenAI recently announced its Sora text-to-video AI generator.

Another explanation could be that users do not yet understand how to fully use AI tools.

A 2023 Upwork survey showed that freelancers make up 38% of the U.S. workforce and that they are 2.2 times more likely to regularly use generative AI than other professionals for tasks like research, brainstorming, and coding.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/ai-is-taking-over-these-freelancing-jobs-the-most-report/471183

Dollar General Store Closes After Entire Staff Quits on Same Day

A Dollar General store in Wisconsin had to temporarily shut down after the entire staff quit last week due to a “lack of appreciation,” including low pay and an “immoral” food donation policy, per a note left on the door.

In photos of signage posted on the windows of the Mineral Point, Wisconsin, Dollar General, the employees cite that the “whole team” (six employees) decided to walk away, thanking the customers.

“We can not and will not work for a company that does not stand behind in true honest form of what they want the world to see them as,” the notice reads. “Although we love and adore our customers we must take a stand for the community and not allow Corporate Greed to [continue] preventing people in need of the help they need and could receive.”

Dollar General said that the store was closed for only about three hours on Saturday before reopening at 11 a.m.

By Monday, the store was working with a full staff of new and transferred workers.

One former employee, Trina Tribolet, said that she only had one weekend off since Christmas and alleged that the store only donated food to local pantries according to “very specific guidelines.”

“We’re throwing away coffee that’s not expired but it’s close. Or you’re throwing out a box of Lucky Charms that you know there’s a whole world of kids who would love to eat those,” Tribolet told local outlet Spectrum News 1. “But you can’t donate them out, because you’re supposed to throw them away. There have been tears that have been shed … It’s sickening, and it’s saddening, especially for someone that has morals.”

In response to Tribolet, Dollar General told the outlet that it’s continuing to follow the Feeding America guidelines.

“The Mineral Point Dollar General store has donated nearly 7,500 pounds of food to local food banks such as Second Harvest Food Bank of Southern Wisconsin over the past twelve months,” the spokesperson told the outlet. “Food safety is a top priority for Dollar General and Feeding America members, therefore, DG stores are required to follow Feeding America donation policies.”

Dollar General did not immediately respond to Entrepreneur‘s request for comment.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/dollar-general-store-closes-after-entire-staff-quits/471124

CEO Says He Tried to Hire an AI Researcher from Meta and Was Told to ‘Come Back to Me When You Have 10,000 H100 GPUs’

^{This article originally appeared on Business Insider.}

Recruiting AI talent can be a tough feat for some companies.

Aravind Srinivas, the founder and CEO of Perplexity, an AI-powered question-and-answer engine, described his interaction with a job candidate that shows how hard it can be to hire people with generative AI skills.

“I tried to hire a very senior researcher from Meta, and you know what they said? ‘Come back to me when you have 10,000 H100 GPUs,'” Srinivas said on a recent episode of the business advice podcast “Invest Like the Best.”

H100 GPUs refer to Nvidia’s highly coveted graphic-processing units that tech giants like Meta, OpenAI, and Google use in their data centers to power and train their AI chatbots.

“That would cost billions and take five to 10 years to get from Nvidia,” Srinivas said.

Limited funds, combined with a chip shortage, means Perplexity, which powers its Q&A engine using GPT-4, has found it tough to find the talent required to create a large language model, Srinivas said.

Srinivas said it’s difficult to get employees to leave a company where they “have a great experimentation stack and existing models to bootstrap from.”

“You have to offer such amazing incentives and immediate availability of computing. And we’re not talking of small compute clusters here,” he said.

The CEO added that even if smaller firms like Perplexity are able to get Nvidia’s chips, they’ll continue to fall behind because AI is developing so quickly.

Srinivas said AI talent at major tech companies “will have already made the next-generation model.”

“They’re like, ‘Look, the world has changed, I’m already in the next generation,'” he added. “‘I’ll come when the next version of the model is finished training. This time, you come back to me when you have 20,000 H100s.'”

Srinivas and Meta didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider before publication.

There’s been a rapid uptick in interest in AI skills like machine learning and data engineering since OpenAI launched ChatGPT in November 2022. Companies like Amazon, Netflix, and Meta have offered salaries as high as $900,000 a year to attract generative AI talent, and non-tech companies across the education, healthcare, and legal sectors have been looking to fill roles with workers who know how to use AI.

Srinivas believes that workers need skills beyond the ability to create AI models that generate desirable outputs.

“You have to post-train them and address the long tail of issues you get on serving a product,” the CEO said.

Post-training expertise, like knowing how to reduce a chatbot’s factual inaccuracies, is an important skill that employees from a wide range of digital industries can learn quickly, Srinivas said.

Leaning into that skill set, he said, will help AI companies like Perplexity stand out in a sector dominated by Big Tech.

“You have tremendous advantage to create a lot of value,” he said about post-training skills. “And we are focused on that.”

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/trying-to-recruit-ai-talent-good-luck-with-that-new-report/471112

Think Creating an App Will Make You Rich? A New Report Suggests What Works — and What Definitely Doesn’t

The median monthly revenue of an app on the market for one year is less than $50.

That’s according to the latest research from RevenueCat (RC), a mobile subscription services company. RC’s 2024 report anonymizes data and uses it to break down what works — and what doesn’t — when entrepreneurs try to make money from subscription app revenue.

Since its founding in 2017, RC has tracked nearly 30,000 apps that use its tools to collectively generate more than $6 billion in revenue. Its clients include Reuters, the workspace app Notion, and the photo editing app PhotoRoom.

Here are some key findings.

What Works

Even though the median monthly revenue for a subscription app is low, RC pointed out that there’s a difference in success levels depending on the category. Health and fitness apps performed about twice as well as all the other categories combined after a year. The top 5% of health and fitness subscription apps had a median monthly revenue of $4,564.82.

Other categories saw lower median earnings, with the second-highest numbers belonging to social/lifestyle apps. The top 5% in that section brought in a median of $2,769.31 in monthly revenue.

It’s difficult for apps to reach $1,000 in revenue per month, with only 17% of apps achieving the milestone. From that point on, growth appears to get easier, with 59% of apps that hit $1,000 reaching $2,500 per month, and 60% of those apps reaching $5,000 per month.

Photo and video apps reached the milestone of $1,000 in monthly revenue more quickly than any other category, which RC attributed to the growth of AI image apps last year.

There’s a large gap in profit between top-performing apps and lower-performing ones, with the top 5% taking home 200 times as much revenue as the bottom 25%.

Still, RC cautioned readers that “not all revenue is created equal” and gave the example of apps that bring in top revenue numbers, but break even or lose money after they factor in the cost of acquiring customers.

“Revenue doesn’t mean you have a good business; profit means you have a good business,” RC wrote in the report.

What Doesn’t Work

Travel apps were the lowest performing in revenue, with the top 5% bringing in a median of $852.84 per month. However, travel was the best category for converting trial users into weekly or annual subscribers, with a conversion rate of 54.3%, which could mean that users had a stronger intention behind their decision to try the app.

Users will pay for subscription apps if they believe that the app solves a real problem they face, according to RC.

“It’s your job to show the user you understand the problem and have a viable solution for it – ideally in the first session,” the report reads. “In other words, you want to get a user to that ‘aha moment’ within 60 seconds of installing your app.”

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/want-to-create-an-app-these-categories-make-the-most-money/471102

Costco CFO Reveals Uncertain Fate of $1.50 Hot Dog and Soda Combo

Costco is well-known for many things, but its $1.50 hot dog and soda combo is full on famous — mostly because it has stayed the same price since 1985.

In fact, Costco co-founder Jim Sinegal once infamously told the company’s former CEO Craig Jelinek: “If you raise the effing hot dog, I will kill you. Figure it out.”

Taking Sinegal’s kind words to heart, the price has stayed the same, even amid inflation and rising supply costs.

But in a new interview with Bloomberg, Costco’s CFO Richard Galanti isn’t making any promises that the price won’t change, eventually.

When asked about the future of the $1.50 combo when Galanti steps down on March 15, he responded ambiguously.

“It’s probably safe for a while,” Galanti said.

Galanti is set to be succeeded by Gary Millerchip, the former CFO of Kroger.

Still, Galanti insists that during his nearly 40-year tenure at the company, the essence of Costco hasn’t changed either.

“The underlying culture of the company hasn’t changed,” he told Bloomberg. “It is what the founders wrote, the five things that you’re going to do, in this order: Obey the law, take care of your customers, take care of your employees, respect your suppliers — be tough, but fair. Then, reward your shareholders.”

Costco is coming off of a strong fiscal Q2 2024, with a net income of $1.74 billion quarter compared to $1.47 billion at the same time last year, with revenue increasing $55.27 billion from the same time last year.

Costco was up over 55% year over year as of Wednesday afternoon.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/costco-ceo-reveals-fate-of-150-hot-dog-and-soda-combo/471115

Chili’s Customer Goes Viral After Claiming 3-Item Meal Is Cheaper Than McDonald’s

As fast food prices continue to skyrocket, many customers have taken to social media to complain — and some are finding affordable options in unexpected places.

In a viral TikTok that’s been viewed over 1.2 million times, Eason Trbojevic said that dining at his local Chili’s is now cheaper than popping into McDonald’s.

Trbojevic blamed alleged “price gouging” as his reason for leaving fast food behind and shared that the “3 for Me” deal at Chili’s, allows customers to choose an appetizer, drink, and meal for around $11. (According to Chili’s website, the deal starts at $10.99.)

@easontrbojevic #fyp #boomer #woke #lgbt #taylorswift #letthemeatcereal #taylorandtravis #eattherich ♬ original sound – Eason Trbojevic

“You get your drink, your little chips, your cheeseburger, and your french fries,” he tells viewers. A text overlay that reads: “Chili’s is cheaper than McDonald’s, yet no one is here.”

Some commenters were “stunned” to find out how much cheaper the bill was at Chili’s.

“Def prefer these chain restaurants,” one wrote. “I go to Applebee’s and spend less than McDonald’s.”

“A sit-down is now the same prices as drive-thru here, too,” another said.

It is unclear which McDonald’s Trbojevic previously went to, but the chain offers a $1 $2 $3 menu, which theoretically could offer a lower-priced meal than Chili’s.

McDonald’s has been under scrutiny lately as customers have accused the Golden Arches of unaffordable prices.

Though an estimated 93% of McDonald’s 38,000 locations are franchised, and franchisees can set prices based on the store’s location and the demand, an overall increase in prices has led the company’s CEO Chris Kempczinski to promise more “affordability” in the months ahead.

“I think what you’re going to see as you head into 2024 is probably more attention to what I would describe as affordability,” Kempczinski said on an earnings call last month after a sales miss in Q1 2024 due to higher menu prices.

The chain raised prices by an estimated 10% by the end of 2023.

Last summer, a rest-stop location of McDonald’s in Darien, Connecticut went viral after a customer found exposed the higher-than-normal menu prices which included a 10-piece McNugget order for a sky-high $18.29 and a McCrispy sandwich for $17.99.

McDonald’s did not immediately respond to Entrepreneur’s request for comment.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/business-news/is-chilis-cheaper-than-mcdonalds-viral-tiktok-says-yes/471059