Allbirds Is Now An AI Company - History Is Not Impressed

Early in my career, a senior partner told me something I never forgot: “Cosmo, in this business, you’ll continually see the same mistakes made by different people. Your job is to recognize them faster each time.”

I thought about him this week.

From wool runners to GPU runners

You may know Allbirds. They’re the sustainable sneaker company that became the unofficial footwear of Silicon Valley. Founded in 2015, their merino wool shoes were so popular with tech workers that wearing a pair of Allbirds to a board meeting was practically a dress code. In 2021, they went public and reached a $4.1 billion valuation.

Then the market remembered they were a shoe company.

Sales fell. Then fell some more. Between 2022 and 2025, revenues dropped nearly 50%. They closed all their U.S. stores. The stock shed approximately 99% of its value from peak to trough.

At Tuesday’s close, the entire company was worth roughly $24 million, which is less than what it cost to build many of the stores it just finished closing.

So what did Allbirds do? On Wednesday, they announced they are selling the Allbirds brand and pivoting to AI compute infrastructure. The new company will be called NewBird AI. The stock surged 641% in a single day.

I’ll give you a moment with that.

Wait. I’ve seen this movie before.

Back in December 2017, a little-known nonalcoholic beverage company in Long Island, New York, made a startling announcement. Long Island Iced Tea Company — facing potential Nasdaq delisting with annual sales of roughly $5 million — declared it was shifting its “primary corporate focus toward the exploration of and investment in opportunities that leverage the benefits of blockchain technology.” It was also changing its name to Long Blockchain Corp.

The stock jumped 432% in one day. The company had not yet invested in or partnered with any blockchain company. It was, in the truest sense, in the “preliminary stages of evaluating specific opportunities.”

Those preliminary stages never advanced. Long Blockchain was subsequently delisted from Nasdaq, subpoenaed by the SEC, and investigated by the FBI for alleged insider trading and securities fraud. Its blockchain business, as ...

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