🏠 Lowe’s DIY drought

…and CEO supercommuters (Justin Sullivan/Getty Images) Light cart   Sponsored by Hey Snackers, The early bird gets the decorative bird: collectors of Target’s $5 seasonal foam-stuffed birds are [flocking]( to get their hands on the new Halloween collection. #Summerween is here. US stocks dipped yesterday, [snapping the market’s]( longest win streak of the year. Today we’ll get minutes from the Fed’s July meeting, but the most up-to-date comments on interest-rate policy could come from Chair Powell’s speech at Jackson Hole on Friday.   CUL-DE-SAC [Lowe’s fails to nail earnings as home-improvement retailers face a DIY drought]( Hitting a wall… The urge to retile your bathroom isn’t as strong as it used to be. Lowe’s sales #s disappointed yesterday: quarterly revenue fell more than 5% and profit slipped 11% as shoppers kept cutting back on big-ticket projects like new kitchen floors. Lowe’s said bad weather also hurt sales for its outdoor products (think: four-piece patio sets). The home-improvement staple slashed its annual guidance as DIY customers — who make up 75% of its business — sit on the sidelines. - Locked in: Nearly all of Lowe’s customers have mortgage rates under 4%, but with borrowing costs at multiyear highs, many are avoiding taking out new loans to make upgrades. - Small haul: Last week, rival Home Depot slashed its annual sales forecast and warned of weaker spending to come after its customers pulled back on bigger projects last quarter (transactions over $1K were down 6%). Reno rollback… High mortgage rates have created the least affordable [housing]( market in nearly two decades. Even as housing inventory rebounds, sky-high prices have kept many would-be buyers out of the market. Median home prices in the US hit a record $419K in May. That’s thrown a wrench in the home-makeover market, since owners tend to spend the most on upgrades within the first three years of buying. In the first quarter, spending on remodeling dropped for the first time in a decade. THE TAKEAWAY Fix the base before the space… When people are antsy about the economy, they tend to spend less on unnecessary upgrades. Experts predict overall spending on home improvement and repairs will fall to about $450B this year — a 7% drop from last year. We’ll get the scoop on the housing market when home sales #s come out this week. [Read this online]( Sponsored by Dice Cream This company built a robot to serve ice cream 🧊 Ice-cold combo… Dice Cream is bringing next-gen robotics together with a timeless classic: ice cream. With a robotic arm for scooping and AI-powered customer interface, the company’s autonomous ice cream parlor sits at the cutting-edge of the $80B ice cream industry. 🎲 Auto-parlor… Dice Cream’s parlor take as little as 40 seconds to fulfill an order. The low-maintenance design maximizes efficiency and volume — helping to keep labor costs low and margins high. 🍨 Iced, priced and Diced… With a functioning prototype1 and partnerships in place to begin operations in South America, Korea and Taiwan,2[Dice Cream is looking to expand quickly](, delivering more scoops than humanly possible.3 Investors can get in at $1/share4 until August 28 — [discover the Dice Cream offering now!](5 Sponsored by Dice Cream This company built a robot to serve ice cream 🧊 Ice-cold combo… Dice Cream is bringing next-gen robotics together with a timeless classic: ice cream. With a robotic arm for scooping and AI-powered customer interface, the company’s autonomous ice cream parlor sits at the cutting-edge of the $80B ice cream industry. 🎲 Auto-parlor… Dice Cream’s parlor take as little as 40 seconds to fulfill an order. The low-maintenance design maximizes efficiency and volume — helping to keep labor costs low and margins high. 🍨 Iced, priced and Diced… With a functioning prototype1 and partnerships in place to begin operations in South America, Korea and Taiwan,2[Dice Cream is looking to expand quickly](, delivering more scoops than humanly possible.3 Investors can get in at $1/share4 until August 28 — [discover the Dice Cream offering now!](5   RT-NO [Starbucks’ new CEO will supercommute to HQ as top execs get special RTO treatment]( There’s zero traffic… when you fly to work. Starbucks’ incoming CEO, Brian Niccol, is getting a major [work perk](: he doesn’t have to move from his home of Newport Beach, California, to the coffee chain’s headquarters in Seattle. But for Niccol working remotely will mean less pajama-PJs and more private jet-PJs. He’s expected to commute 1K miles to HQ and travel to other sites such as roasting facilities and stores. He’ll also be set up with a remote office and assistant in Newport Beach. - Starbucks said that Niccol’s time spent between Seattle and other work sites will “exceed the hybrid work guidelines” that former boss Howard Schultz laid down last year, which require employees to work in Seattle three times a week. - Shaken up: Some folks say Niccol’s getting unfair special treatment, especially considering that Starbucks employees signed a letter protesting RTO in March. One X user said, “Leadership is about setting the tone — this one might be off-key.” Not blending in… Niccol is not the only exec with relocation perks in their offer letter. Victoria’s Secret’s new boss, Hillary Super (also [recently poached](), can work from New York rather than in the company’s main office in Columbus, Ohio. Another alternative for new CEOs: moving the HQ itself. When Niccol started his previous gig as head of Chipotle, the burrito chain’s main office was moved from Denver to Newport Beach. Similarly, Ken Griffin relocated his hedge fund, Citadel, from Chicago to Miami. THE TAKEAWAY Flexibility’s not a free add-in… Like any other offer-letter perk, remote work tends to be easier to negotiate for higher-level employees who companies really want to lock in. Starbucks might think Niccol is worth bending the RTO policy for. Only 14% of working US adults are fully remote, but more than 40% of office workers say they’d take a pay cut to work remotely. [Read this online](   ON SHERWOOD The most powerful company in tech is a niche Dutch business you've probably never heard of]( Without ASML — whose machines weigh as much as two jets and are precise to 8 nanometers — AI as we know it wouldn’t exist. [Read more.](   What else we're Snackin' - [Lift](: Alaska Airlines said its planned $1.9B merger with Hawaiian Airlines cleared the DOJ, leaving the Transportation Department as the next hurdle to takeoff. JetBlue and Spirit’s merger plan got blocked. - [Beef](: Shein sued its Chinese ecomm rival Temu, saying that it encourages design and IP theft (and that it loses money on every sale). Last year, Temu sued Shein alleging “mafia-style intimidation of suppliers.” - [Taxing](: VP Kamala Harris’ campaign said she’ll work to raise the corporate tax rate to 28% from 21% if elected president. The tax bump could help fund Harris’ proposed tax-relief plans for working-class Americans. - [Flixing](: Netflix stock hit a record high yesterday after the streamer said its upfront ad commitments were up 150% for this year. Netflix’s live-sports deals with the NFL and WWE have fueled demand for ad slots. - [EU-turn](: The EU reversed some of its tariff-hiking plans for China-made EVs, slashing the % of its proposed tariffs and duties. Tariffs on Teslas imported from China would be 9% instead of 21%.   Snack Fact of the Day [For the first time, a bar of gold is worth $1M](d   Wednesday - FOMC July meeting meetings published - Air Guitar World Championships begin - Earnings expected from Target, Macy’s, TJX, Zoom, and Urban Outfitters Authors of this Snacks own shares of: Starbucks and Tesla Advertiser's disclosures: 1 There is a working product prototype, but the product is still currently under development. 2 Dice Cream currently has non-binding LOIs signed with Shoprider to operate 80 units across Japan and Korea, and 75 units across South America 3 Each parlor would be able to serve over 500 customers before needing restocking. [Dice Cream’s Unmatched Capacity and Efficiency](, 6/13/24 Update 4 The minimum investment for this round is $300. 5 Equity crowdfunding investments in private placements, and start-up investments in particular, are speculative and involve a high degree of risk and those investors who cannot afford to lose their entire investment should not invest in start-ups. Companies seeking startup investment through equity crowdfunding tend to be in earlier stages of development and their business model, products and services may not yet be fully developed, operational or tested in the public marketplace. There is no guarantee that the stated valuation and other terms are accurate or in agreement with the market or industry valuations. Further, investors may receive illiquid and/or restricted stock that may be subject to holding period requirements and/or liquidity concerns. Please read the offering circular and related risks at [Dice Cream’s Start Engine page](. 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