Dear Chessable community,
On Thursday, June 23rd, we had one of the toughest days in Chessable’s history as we had to start the process of letting go of a number of our colleagues to adapt to the new economic reality that is in front of us.
I would like to provide some context and how we came to this very difficult decision.
Over the last years, as Chessable has grown and become a leading destination for chess learning, we have rapidly grown in users, published hundreds of courses and also increased the size of our team. Essentially, since inception, all of our revenues have been reinvested into our people and growing the chess community and ecosystem.
Unfortunately, despite our expanded operations, growth has become more challenging due to what seems like a very sudden shift in the macroeconomic climate. From initial observations and conversations, it seems like this is something that other digital consumer companies are also experiencing.
For this reason, and consistent with the message from our parent, Play Magnus Group at the 1st Quarter presentation at the end of May, we needed to act quickly and reduce costs, including the size of our teams. We make these cost reductions with a heavy heart, and it is something we do not ever want to do again.
Although we’ve done everything possible to reduce expenses and minimize the impact on our people, we still needed to let go of 29 colleagues, some part-time, but most of them full-time. This has been very sad and difficult for all of us, as everyone who had to move on shared our passion for chess learning. We are grateful to all of our past team members for their contributions. Your work will forever be a part of the Chessable story.
Reactions among our former colleagues are mixed. I understand why. Most are sympathetic to our predicament and are grateful for having had the opportunity to work as part of our team. Some have even sent very kind messages of support. But, to some, the layoffs came as a surprise or a shock and for that, we are deeply sorry. It was a painful decision to make, but we believe it had to be done for the long-term sustainability of Chessable.
We know how important Chessable is for the over 500,000 users, the hundreds of authors and publishers and all of our employees. We care deeply about our mission to make studying chess more fun and efficient in the coming years. As we undertake these changes, we believe Chessable is well equipped for future sustainable growth of the company.
Given these changes, while there will be some impact to how we operate going forward. We will be ever more focused and continue to build upon our core initiatives. We will continue to publish high quality content on a regular basis. We will continue to build on the MoveTrainer® technology with the aim to continuously improve the learning experience. We will also continue to focus on the Chessable Classroom.
As a recap of what we’ve done and what’s to come in 2022:
- Published hundreds of great new courses already in 2022, with more to come (Magnus course soon!)
- Released offline video mode feature in the mobile app so that you can now watch videos wherever you go
- Closed beta release of Chessable Classroom, which will soon see a full release to over 1000 academies and coaches and over 10,000 potential new students
- Personalized tactics courses for those of you who wish to connect their playzone identity to their Chessable account to learn from their mistakes with the power of MoveTrainer.
- We’ve also published the first exclusive PRO membership course of which we hope to release many more in the future for our PRO members.
And, there are many more exciting things to come.
I feel confident that with this decision behind us, Chessable can weather the upcoming difficult economic climate and come out even stronger when the economy has recovered and starts to look up again. Thank you to all of our customers, and stakeholders for your continued support. If anyone has any questions or comments, please don’t hesitate to reach out.
