- In today’s CEO Daily: Jason Del Rey talks to Chewy CEO Sumit Singh about chaos, pets, and recessions.
- The big story: Trump cabinet members disclose their crypto holdings.
- The markets: Low drama.
- Analyst notes from Guggenheim on Tesla, Goldman Sachs on stocks, Convera on the weakening dollar.
- Plus: All the news and watercooler chat from Fortune.
Good morning. I’ve just returned from SXSW, the mega entertainment and tech conference in Austin which is always a whirlwind of deals, announcements, and—of course—CEOs talking their book. I got a chance to chat with Chewy CEO Sumit Singh, who, as the head of an e-commerce company that survived the intense ebbs and flows of consumer demand during COVID, has some experience with navigating chaos.
So when it comes to the current macroeconomic anxiety—inflamed by potential stagflation, Trump-induced trade wars, and a stock market downturn—Singh’s approach is a pragmatic one.
“There’s a low signal-to-noise ratio right now across multiple industries,” Singh acknowledged in a discussion with me on stage Monday. “[But] you deal with chaos by dealing with chaos. You focus on what you can control.”
For Singh and his leadership team at Chewy, now No. 362 on the 2024 Fortune 500 with more than $11 billion in revenue, that means a focus on the business inputs that matter most: unsexy practices like keeping inventory in stock at high levels; maintaining customer service levels that have become the company’s calling card; and acquiring and retaining customers affordably. And that’s especially true when the output—such as his company’s stock price—is faltering. Chewy’s stock is down more than 11% over the last month, or about 50% more than the drop of the S&P 500.
“If those inputs are in line, then even if, for the short term, the output seems a little bit off, the long-term output will be fine,” Singh said.
Singh radiates a natural optimism but Chewy also boasts a relatively strong market position. Only a small fraction of the pet merchandise the company sells originates in China, so tariffs wouldn’t be devastating. Also, while Singh no longer believes Chewy is totally recession-proof, he does trust it’s recession-resistant because pet parents, as the company calls them, will continue to spend on the food their pets need when budgets get tight, even if some of their more discretionary spending with Chewy goes away. In fact, about 75% of Chewy’s sales come courtesy of the company’s automated replenishment shipping service.
But there’s also a more personal reason why Singh says he’s able to play it cool even when the world around him seems to be spinning with upheaval: his homeland. He spent his first 20-plus years in India but has now lived for more than two decades in the U.S. As he puts it: “India is inherently chaotic.” These days, the same could be said about the U.S. — Jason Del Rey
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Contact CEO Daily via Diane Brady at diane.brady@fortune.com
