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(NEW YORK) — Low-price fashion chain Forever 21, a one-time hot destination for teen shoppers that fell victim to its own rapid expansion and changing consumer tastes, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

The privately held company based in Los Angeles said Sunday it will close up to 178 stores in the U.S. As of the bankruptcy filing, the company operated about 800 stores globally, including more than 500 stores in the U.S.

The company said it would focus on maximizing the value of its U.S. stores and shutter certain international locations. Forever 21 plans to close most of its locations in Asia and Europe but will continue operating in Mexico and Latin America.

"The decisions as to which domestic stores will be closing are ongoing, pending the outcome of continued conversations with landlords," it said in the statement. "We do, however, expect a significant number of these stores will remain open and operate as usual, and we do not expect to exit any major markets in the U.S."

Forever 21 joins Barneys New York and Diesel USA in a growing list of retailers seeking bankruptcy protection as they battle online competitors. Others like Payless ShoeSource and Charlotte Russe have shut down completely.

The numbers bear out the crisis facing traditional retailers. So far this year, publicly traded U.S. retailers have announced they will close 8,558 stores and open 3,446, according to the global research firm Coresight Research. That compares with 5,844 closures and 3,258 openings in all of 2018.

Coresight estimates the store closures could number 12,000 by the end of 2019.

Forever 21 was founded in 1984 and, along with other so-called fast fashion chains like H&M and Zara, rode a wave of popularity among young customers that took off in the mid-1990s.

Their popularity grew during the Great Recession, when shoppers sought fashion bargains.

But over the last year or so, fast fashion has fallen out of style. Young customers are losing interest in throw-away clothes and are more interested in buying eco-friendly products. They're also gravitating toward rental and online second-hand sites like Thredup, where they see clothes worn again instead of ending up in a landfill.

These trends are happening while discounters like Target have spruced up their fashion assortments, stealing away customers.

Forever 21 has also been more vulnerable than some other chains because of its large footprints in major malls, which are attracting fewer shoppers.

Tesla's treatment of workers organizing a union in California broke U.S. labor laws, a California judge ruled on Friday.

Judge Amita Tracy ordered the company to cease and desist a litany of actions against company employees, including a rule that blocks off-duty employees from handing out union literature and interrogating employees about union activities. She also order the company to reinstate a union employee who had been fired and to compensate him for his lost pay.

The case was filed in April 2017 by several workers at Tesla Fremont, California facility, as well as the international United Automobile Workers (UAW) union. According to court documents, the workers had raised concerns about safety at Tesla facilities, below-market wages and long working hours.

According to a post-hearing brief by lawyers representing Tesla workers and UAW, Tesla had threatened unionizing employees and restricted their right to speak for themselves.

"A company that prides itself as representing the cutting edge for new automotive technology has shown itself, when it comes to labor relations, to be a throwback of the worst sort," the document said.

Among the employees' complaints were accusations that Tesla security guards had repeatedly tried to stop union workers from handing out flyers at the facility, telling them to leave the premises and photographing the workers' badges.

The company also banned employees from handing out materials that were not pre-approved by Tesla. After employees began to wear shirts with union insignias to work, the company also instituted a restrictive dress code that prohibited unapproved pants and shirts.

In the ruling, Tracy also singled out a tweet by the company's founder and CEO, Elon Musk, from May 20, 2018. Musk had tweeted: "Nothing stopping Tesla team at our car plant from voting union. Could do so tmrw if they wanted. But why pay union dues & give up stock options for nothing?"

Tracy noted that Musk's tweet was sent out to his 22,700,000 Twitter followers, and that it "can only be read by a reasonable employee to indicate that if the employees vote to unionize that they would give up stock options."

Court documents also sited several instances in which Musk and Gaby Toledano, Tesla's former chief people officer, discouraged employees from forming a union. Toledano allegedly told the employees "the majority of the workers at Tesla don't want a union" and asked why employees would want to pay union dues.

Jose Moran, a Tesla production associate, said in a statement through the UAW that he knew he would be a "target" after criticizing the company in a 2017 Medium post, "And sure enough, I was singled out and interrogated." He thanked the National Labor Relations Board for taking the case.

"My co-workers and I will continue to speak up, and continue to work to make Tesla a better and safer company. Today's action makes clear that we have rights, that we can keep talking about what we're seeing and experiencing at Tesla," Moran said,

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(Bloomberg) –– Fashion rental service Rent the Runway is refunding and giving out extra cash to disgruntled customers even as it warned that the service disruptions that have plagued the startup for weeks are likely to continue.

"We know we have broken complete customer trust by not delivering their orders on time," Chief Executive Officer Jennifer Hyman said in a phone interview Thursday evening.

She said Rent the Runway will issue refunds as well as give an additional $200 in cash to customers who have had their orders canceled due to the supply chain problems. "To repair that trust, we didn't feel it was right to offer credit to Rent the Runway," she said.

Complaints about outfits that didn't show up on time or never arrived have plagued the clothing subscription service over the past few weeks. Hundreds of customers have expressed their dissatisfaction with both Rent the Runway's special event service — where customers take out designer outfits for formal occasions — and its everyday wear business. The start up, which is valued at over $1 billion and backed by investors like Franklin Templeton, has blamed the installation of a new warehouse software system for the issues.

In an email to customers sent early Friday morning, Hyman warned customers she can't guarantee that orders scheduled to be received this weekend will arrive either. All event orders scheduled to be received the first week of October are canceled and the company is not accepting any new event rental orders or new subscribers until October 15. Regular subscription orders may also be delayed by one or two days until then, the email said.

Rent the Runway's latest troubles began on September 13 after it installed a new system in its New Jersey warehouse, said Hyman. The integration of the new system wreaked havoc on fulfilment, impacting the number of orders that could be shipped each day.

Ultimately, the new software should be "the most significant transformation in our company's history," said Hyman. It will allow the company to make items available faster, thanks to a new racking system for inventory.

Hyman said the problems affected 14% of Rent the Runway's subscriber base and a smaller percentage of event renters. Following the mishaps, the company's supply chain head Marv Cunningham, who previously worked at Target Corp. and Amazon Inc., is stepping down after about a year in the role.

In recent weeks, Rent the Runway's social media pages have been inundated with complaints from customers who weren't able to get help from customer service representatives. There have also been complaints since July over long wait times for customer service, before the warehouse issue. The company said earlier that it would double its customer service staff and make it simpler to cancel subscriptions.

The company was founded in 2009 by Hyman and Jennifer Fleiss, who now works at Walmart Inc., as a rental platform for women to get outfits for special events. It's since grown rapidly into a subscription business, with most of its customers now paying a monthly fee of $159 to rent items ranging from Kate Spade dresses to Oscar de la Renta earrings for everyday use. The service has also starting renting out children's clothing and home decor, attracting criticism that it's expanding too quickly.

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McDonald's is finally taking a nibble of the plant-based burger.

McDonald's said Thursday that will sell the PLT, or the plant, lettuce and tomato burger for 12 weeks in 28 restaurants in Southwestern Ontario by the end of the month.

The small-market test is rolling out about six months after rival Burger King began testing the plant-based Impossible Foods burger, which no surprise, is a rival to Beyond Meat. It's now selling those burgers nationwide because of strong demand from customers.

The entry of McDonald's, the world's largest burger chain, into the alternative meat arena has largely been seen as a question of when, and not if. Shares of Beyond Meat Inc. bolted 11% higher at the opening bell on the McDonald's announcement.

It's been a breakthrough year for the companies that are trying to perfect the no-meat burger.

Beyond Meat became a publicly traded company in May when it listed its shares for $45 on the Nadaq. By July, those shares had risen more than 430%. Impossible Foods has raised more than $750 million, but remains private.

Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods are now appearing on fast food menus across the United States.

KFC last month began testing plant-based chicken nuggets and boneless wings at an Atlanta restaurant in partnership with Beyond Meat. Carl's Jr. and Del Taco also selling Beyond Meat products. Tim Hortons has tested a Beyond Meat breakfast sausage in Canada.

Impossible Foods announced in May that it was making meatless "sausage" crumbles for the Little Caesars pizza chain in some states.

Fans of Wendy's have begun a petition to get the chain to add a plant-based burger to the menu. It's garnered more than 26,000 signatures as of Thursday and earlier this month, CEO Todd Penegor said plant-based burgers are "a trend that will be here to stay.

McDonald's is pushing forward, albeit in a very limited introduction.

"Why just a small test? We're in learning mode, so testing is a major part of how we develop our menu," wrote Ann Wahlgren, McDonald's vice president of global menu strategy. "It's how we look- before we leap."

SAN FRANCISCO — Facebook says it does not fact check politicians' statements on its site, even if they might be false.

The social network operator says that's because such statements could be newsworthy — and it doesn't want to act as a "referee" for political debates.

Facebook works with third-party fact checkers, including The Associated Press, to weed out misinformation, such as false news and manipulated photos and videos.

But Nick Clegg, Facebook's vice president of global affairs, said the company has exempted politicians' posts from its fact checking program for more than a year. But if politicians share previously debunked links or other material, those will be demoted and banned from being included in ads.

"At Facebook, our role is to make sure there is a level playing field, not to be a political participant ourselves," Clegg said, according to a transcript Facebook posted on its website of his speech at the Atlantic Festival in Washington on Tuesday.

Twitter also has a newsworthiness exemption in its policy that adds warning labels to politicians' tweets if they violate the service's rules but involve matters of public interest. Before the policy was enacted in June, Twitter exempted prominent leaders from many of its rules, contending that publishing their controversial tweets helps hold them accountable and encourages discussion.

Critics say treating politicians' speech differently gives them a free pass to spread hate, abuse and misinformation.

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(DETROIT) — As the United Auto Workers' strike against General Motors stretches into a second week, it's not just the company and striking workers getting pinched.

With many replacement part warehouses shut down, dealers are beginning to run short of components to repair cars, trucks and SUVs. And companies that make auto parts are also starting to see work slow down. Dealer inventory of new vehicles is holding up but starting to get depleted on a few models.

Meanwhile, GM is losing millions of dollars and has been forced to close one Canadian factory and send workers home at another. The 49,000 striking workers are going to have to get by on $250 per week in strike pay.

This doesn't even include the restaurants and other businesses around the more than 30 U.S. factories that have been closed due to the strike. And the longer the strike lasts, the worse it will get for everyone.

Here's a look at the ripple effects of the strike as bargaining continues:

AUTO PARTS: The biggest impact so far seems to be the lack of availability of some replacement parts for GM vehicles. The strike has shut down a parts depot in Charlotte, North Carolina, where the Southeast region normally gets its replacements, said Ed Williamson, who owns several GM dealers in the Miami area.

Parts suppliers, especially smaller ones where GM is the main customer, are also starting to get hit, says Morningstar analyst David Whiston. Even bigger ones like Magna International, a Canadian company that makes components for many GM models, is reporting temporary layoffs at some of its U.S. and Canadian operations.

GM spokesman Jim Cain acknowledged there are some parts shortages, but says it is still shipping parts from depots staffed by management, dealers that stockpile parts for sale to other dealers, and outside companies that make parts for GM vehicles.

"Obviously it's a difficult situation, and we are working to find other sources of parts around the country," he said.

DEALER INVENTORY: GM had a hefty 77-day supply of vehicles at the end of August, but big SUVs were only at about 55 days, lower than the industry average of 61. With no shipments since Sept. 16, supplies are starting to drop.

Michelle Krebs, executive analyst for Autotrader, said dealers have told her that they'll have ample supply for another week or so. Sales in September thus far have been slowing from August levels, so supplies aren't being depleted that quickly, she said.

Williamson said he's still got plenty of vehicles, including 80 to 90 days worth of big SUVs such as the Cadillac Escalade and GMC Yukon. But he's running short of the Cadillac XT5 midsize SUV.

GM IN CANADA AND MEXICO: Citi analyst Itay Michalei estimates GM is losing $100 million in profits per day. The strike has already caused GM to lay off 1,850 workers and shut down its assembly plant in Oshawa, Ontario, near Toronto. Another 730 were laid off from an engine plant in St. Catherine's, Ontario, according Unifor, the Canadian auto workers union.

Thus far, GM says no Mexican plants have been shut down, nor has a factory in Ontario that builds the Chevrolet Equinox compact SUV.

UAW WORKERS: Striking workers received their last GM paycheck this past Friday and now will have to rely on $250 per week in union strike pay that starts this Friday. When they're on the job, most workers get about $30 per hour in wages, or roughly $1,200 per week. Whiston estimates that the work stoppage will cost the UAW's roughly $750 million strike fund about $31.5 million per week in strike pay and health care costs.

A child opens a box. He starts jumping and screaming with joy—not an unusual sound in the halls of Mattel's headquarters where researchers test new toys. But this particular toy is a doll, and it's rare for parents to bring boys into these research groups to play with dolls. It's rarer still for a boy to immediately attach himself to one the way Shi'a just did.

An 8-year-old who considers himself gender fluid and whose favorite color is black one week, pink the next, Shi'a sometimes plays with his younger sister's dolls at home, but they're "girly, princess stuff," he says dismissively. This doll, with its prepubescent body and childish features, looks more like him, right down to the wave of bleached blond bangs. "The hair is just like mine," Shi'a says, swinging his head in tandem with the doll's. Then he turns to the playmate in the toy-testing room, a 7-year-old girl named Jhase, and asks, "Should I put on the girl hair?" Shi'a fits a long, blond wig on the doll's head, and suddenly it is no longer an avatar for him, but for his sister.

The doll can be a boy, a girl, neither or both, and Mattel, which calls this the world's first gender-neutral doll, is hoping its launch on Sept. 25 redefines who gets to play with a toy traditionally deemed taboo for half the world's kids. Carefully manicured features betray no obvious gender: the lips are not too full, the eyelashes not too long and fluttery, the jaw not too wide. There are no Barbie-like breasts or broad, Ken-like shoulders. Each doll in the Creatable World series looks like a slender 7-year-old with short hair, but each comes with a wig of long, lustrous locks and a wardrobe befitting any fashion-conscious kid: hoodies, sneakers, graphic T-shirts in soothing greens and yellows, along with tutus and camo pants.

Mattel's first promotional spot for the $29.99 product features a series of kids who go by various pronouns—him, her, them, xem—and the slogan "A doll line designed to keep labels out and invite everyone in." With this overt nod to trans and nonbinary identities, the company is betting on where it thinks the country is going, even if it means alienating a substantial portion of the population. A Pew Research survey conducted in 2017 showed that while 76% of the public supports parents' steering girls to toys and activities traditionally associated with boys, only 64% endorse steering boys toward toys and activities associated with girls.

For years, millennial parents have pushed back against "pink aisles" and "blue aisles" in toy stores in favor of gender-neutral sections, often in the name of exposing girls to the building blocks and chemistry kits that foster interest in science and math but are usually categorized as boys' toys. Major toy sellers have listened, thanks to the millennial generation's unrivaled size, trend-setting ability and buying power. Target eliminated gender-specific sections in 2015. The same year, Disney banished "boys" and "girls" labels from its children's costumes, inviting girls to dress as Captain America and boys as Belle. Last year, Mattel did away with "boys" and "girls" toy divisions in favor of nongendered sections: dolls or cars, for instance.

But the Creatable World doll is something else entirely. Unlike model airplanes or volcano kits, dolls have faces like ours, upon which we can project our own self-image and anxieties. Mattel tested the doll with 250 families across seven states, including 15 children who identify as trans, gender-nonbinary or gender-fluid and rarely see themselves reflected in the media, let alone their playthings. "There were a couple of gender-creative kids who told us that they dreaded Christmas Day because they knew whatever they got under the Christmas tree, it wasn't made for them," says Monica Dreger, head of consumer insights at Mattel. "This is the first doll that you can find under the tree and see is for them because it can be for anyone."

The population of young people who identify as gender-nonbinary is growing. Though no large surveys have been done of kids younger than 10, a recent study by the Williams Institute at the University of California, Los Angeles, found that 27% of California teens identify as gender-nonconforming. And a 2018 Pew study found 35% of Gen Z-ers (born 1995 to 2015) say they personally know someone who uses gender-neutral pronouns like they and them, compared with just 16% of Gen X-ers (born 1965 to 1980). The patterns are projected to continue with Generation Alpha, who were born in 2010 and later. Those kids, along with boys who want to play with dolls and girls who identify as "tomboys" and don't gravitate toward fashion doll play, are an untapped demographic. Mattel currently has 19% market share in the $8 billion doll industry; gaining just one more point could translate to $80 million in revenue for the company.

Mattel sees an even broader potential for Creatable World beyond gender-creative kids. In testing, the company found that Generation Alpha children chafed at labels and mandates no matter their gender identity: They didn't want to be told whom a toy was designed for or how to play with it. They were delighted with a doll that had no name and could transform and adapt according to their whims.

But it's parents who are making the purchasing decisions, and no adult is going to have a neutral reaction to this doll. In testing groups, several parents felt the "gender-neutral" branding of the toy pushed a political agenda, and some adults objected to the notion of their sons ever playing with dolls. Mattel's President Richard Dickson insists the doll isn't intended as a statement. "We're not in the business of politics," he says, "and we respect the decision any parent makes around how they raise their kids. Our job is to stimulate imaginations. Our toys are ultimately canvases for cultural conversation, but it's your conversation, not ours; your opinion, not ours."

Yet even offering customers that blank canvas will be seen as political in a country where gender-neutral bathrooms still stir protests. Mattel joins a cohort of other companies that have chosen a side in a divisive political climate. Just in the past two years, Nike launched a campaign starring Colin Kaepernick after the NFL dropped him from the league for kneeling during the national anthem to protest racism. Airbnb offered free housing to people displaced in the face of President Trump's travel ban. Dick's Sporting Goods stopped selling assault-style weapons after the Parkland shooting. All these companies have reported eventual sales bumps after staking their claim in the culture wars.

When pressed with these examples, Dickson admits that staying neutral is not an option if you want to be perceived as an innovator. "I think being a company today, you have to have a combination of social justice along with commerce, and that balance can be tricky," Dickson says. "Not everyone will appreciate you or agree with you."

In fact, dissent among boomers, Gen X-ers and even millennials may be a positive sign, according to Mattel's own researchers. "If all the parents who saw the dolls said, 'This is what we've been waiting for,' we wouldn't be doing our jobs," says Dreger. "That would mean this should have already been in the market. So we're maybe a little behind where kids are, ahead of where parents are, and that's exactly where we need to be."

***

Walking into Mattel's headquarters, it's difficult to imagine a gender-neutral world of play. A huge mural depicts some of the company's most recognizable toys. A classic bouffanted version of Barbie in a black-and-white bathing suit and heels squints down at visitors. In another picture close by, a little boy puffs out his chest and rips open his shirt, Superman style, to reveal a red Mattel logo that reads "Strength and Excellence." Even a toddler would be able to discern the messaging on how a woman and a man are expected to look from these images.

But the evolution within Mattel is obvious once visitors make their way past the entryway and into the designers' cubicles. Inspiration boards are covered with pictures of boys in skirts and girls in athletic gear. The most striking images are mashups of popular teen stars: the features of Camila Mendes and Cole Sprouse, who play Veronica and Jughead on Riverdale, combine to create one androgynous face, and Millie Bobby Brown and Finn Wolfhard, who play the main characters on Stranger Things, blend into a single floppy-haired, genderless person with sharp cheekbones.

In the past decade, toy companies have begun to tear down gender barriers. Smaller businesses like GoldieBlox, which launched in 2012 and builds engineering toys targeting girls, and large companies like Lego, which created the female-focused Lego Friends line the same year, have made STEM toys for girls more mainstream. Small independent toymakers have pushed things further with dollhouses painted green and yellow instead of purple and pink, or cooking kits that are entirely white instead of decorated with flowers or butterflies.

Perhaps it's surprising, then, that nobody has beaten Mattel to creating a gender-neutral doll. A deep Google search for such a toy turns up baby dolls or strange-looking plush creatures that don't resemble any human who ever walked this earth. Nothing comes close to the Creatable World doll that Mattel has conjured up over the past two years.

Scientists have debunked the idea that boys are simply born wanting to play with trucks and girls wanting to nurture dolls. A study by psychologists Lisa Dinella and Erica Weisgram, co-editors of Gender Typing of Children's Toys: How Early Play Experiences Impact Development, found that when wheeled toys were painted white — and thus deprived of all color signaling whether they were "boys' toys" or "girls' toys" — girls and boys chose to play with the wheeled toys equally as often. Dinella points out that removing gendered cues from toys facilitates play between boys and girls, crucial practice for when men and women must interact in the workplace and home as adults. She adds that millennials (born 1981 to 1996) have pushed to share child-care responsibilities, and that battle ought to begin in the playroom. "If boys, like girls, are encouraged to learn parental skills with doll play at a young age, you wind up with more nurturing and empathetic fathers," she says.

And yet creating a doll to appeal to all kids, regardless of gender, remains risky. "There are children who are willing to cross those gender boundaries that society places on toys, but there's often a cost that comes with crossing those boundaries," Dinella says. "That cost seems to be bigger for boys than it is for girls." Some of those social repercussions no doubt can be traced to parental attitudes. In Los Angeles, the majority of the seven parents in an early testing group for Creatable World complained the doll "feels political," as one mom put it.

"I don't think my son should be playing with dolls," she continued. "There's a difference between a girl with a truck and a boy with a Barbie, and a boy with a Barbie is a no-no."

The only dad in the group shrugged: "I don't know. My daughter is friends with a boy who wears dresses. I used to be against that type of thing, but now I'm O.K. with it."

In videos of those testing groups, many parents fumbled with the language to describe the dolls, confusing gender (how a person identifies) with sexuality (whom a person is attracted to), mixing up gender-neutral (without gender) and trans (a person who has transitioned from one gender to another) and fretting about the mere idea of a boy playing with a doll. A second mom in Los Angeles asked before seeing the doll, "Is it transgender? How am I supposed to have a conversation with my kid about that?" After examining the toy and discussing gender-fluidity with the other parents, she declared, "It's just too much. Can't we go back to 1970?"

After the session, Dreger analyzed the parental response. "Adults get so tied up in the descriptions and definitions," she said. "They jump to this idea of sexuality. They make themselves more anxious about it. For kids it's much more intuitive."

Why, exactly, a new generation is rejecting categorizations that society has been using for millennia is up for debate. Eighty-one percent of Gen Z-ers believe that a person shouldn't be defined by gender, according to a poll by the J. Walter Thompson marketing group. But it's not just about gender — it's about authenticity, whether real or perceived. Macho male actors and glam, ultra-feminine actresses have less cultural cache than they used to. Gen Z, with its well-honed radar for anything overly polished or fake-seeming, prefers YouTube confessionals about battling everything from zits to depression. When the New York Times recently asked Generation Z to pick a name for itself, the most-liked response was "Don't call us anything."

Perhaps their ideas of gender have expanded under the influence of parents who are beginning to reject practices like gender-reveal parties that box kids in even before they are born. Jenna Karvunidis, who popularized the gender-reveal party, recently revealed on Facebook that her now 10-year-old child is gender-nonconforming and that she regrets holding the party. "She's telling me 'Mom, there are many genders. Mom, there's many different sexualities and all different types,' and I take her lead on that," Karvunidis said in an interview with NPR.

Perhaps it's that a generation of kids raised on video games where they could create their own avatars, with whatever styling and gender they please has helped open up the way kids think about identity. Perhaps the simple fact that more celebrities like Amandla Stenberg and Sam Smith are coming out as gender-nonbinary has made it easier for other young people to do the same. Generation Alpha, the most diverse generation in America in all senses of the term, is likely to grow up with even more liberal views on gender.

"This is a rallying cry of this generation," says Jess Weiner, a cultural consultant for large companies looking to tap into modern-day markets and navigate issues of gender. "Companies in this day and age have to evolve or else they die, they go away … And part of that evolving is trying to understand things they didn't prior."

Mattel isn't the first company to notice the trend among young shoppers moving away from gender-specific products. Rob Smith—the founder of the Phluid Project, a gender-free clothing store that caters to the LGBTQ+ community in New York City—says several large corporations, including Mattel, have approached him for advice on how to market to the young masses. "I work with a lot of companies who are figuring out that the separation between male and female is less important to young consumers who don't want to be boxed into anything," he says. "There's men's shampoo and women's shampoo, but it's just all shampoo. Companies are starting to investigate that in-between space in order to win over Gen Z."

Still, Mattel enters a politically charged debate at a precarious moment for corporations in America, where companies that want to gain customer loyalty are being pushed to one aisle or the other. A study from the PR agency Weber Shandwick found 47% of millennials think CEOs should take stances on social issues. Some 51% of millennials surveyed said they are more likely to buy products from companies run by activist CEOs. Now, if you walk into a Patagonia store, you'll see a sign that reads, "The President stole your land. Take action now."

Such activism is often born of self-interest: companies want to appeal to liberal customers and retain young employees and their allies. They face little risk by speaking up, but major consequences by sitting on the sidelines. In August, customers boycotted Equinox and SoulCycle—two companies that have aggressively courted the LGBTQ+ community—when reports emerged that their key investor was holding a fundraiser for Trump with ticket prices as high as $250,000. According to data analyses by Second Measure, a month later, SoulCycle attendance is down almost 13%.

Weiner says SoulCycle's experience should serve as a cautionary tale. "I think businesses of any size now recognize that their consumer base values transparency over any other attribute. They want to know that your board is reflective of your choices, and that's caught a lot of businesses off guard," Weiner says. "You can't talk about gender equity in your commercial and then have no women on your board. They have to be savvy."

Now, a toy company has chosen to make a product specifically to appeal to the progressive part of the country. Lisa McKnight, the senior vice president of the global doll portfolio at Mattel, says major retailers have been enthusiastic about Creatable World. "They're excited about the message of inclusivity," she says. "The world is becoming a more diverse and inclusive place, and some people want to do more to support that." When pressed on the risks, she lays out the alternative. "Candidly, we ask ourselves if another company were to launch a product line like this, how would we feel? And after that gut check, we are proceeding."

Mattel will launch Creatable World exclusively online first, in part to better control the message. That includes giving sneak previews to select influencers and leaders in the LGBTQ+ community. Selling the doll in retail stores will be more complicated. For one thing, there's the question of where to place it in stores to attract the attention of shoppers who might not venture into a doll section. Store clerks will have to be trained in what pronouns to use when talking about the doll and how to handle anxious parents' questions about it. And then there are practical concerns. Dickson admits the company is ready for the possibility that protests against Creatable World dolls could hurt other Mattel brands, namely Barbie.

Mattel has taken risks before. Most recently, in 2016, it added three new body types to the Barbie doll: tall, petite and, most radically, curvy. It was the first time the company had made a major change to one of the most recognizable brands—and bodies—in the world in the doll's almost-60-year history. The change helped propel Barbie from a retrograde doll lambasted by feminists for her impossible shape to a modern toy. She is now on the rise. Her sales have been up for the last eight quarters, and she saw a 14% sales bump in the last year alone, according to Mattel.

But Mattel felt late to the game when it changed Barbie's body: For years the Mindy Kalings and Ashley Grahams of the world had been championing fuller body types. Parents had been demanding change with boycotts and letter campaigns. By contrast, Creatable World feels like uncharted territory. Consider children's media: Disney hasn't introduced a major gay character in any of its movies, let alone a gender-nonconforming one. There are no trans superheroes. Even characters whose creators say they are queer—like Dumbledore in the Harry Potter series—haven't actually come out on the page or the screen. In that pop-culture space, a gender-neutral doll seems radical.

Even though there is no scientific evidence to prove that this is the case, there will be customers who say that even exposing their children to a gender-nonbinary doll through commercials or in a play group would threaten to change their child's identity. This debate will spin out into sociopolitical questions about whether the types of toys children play with affect their sense of identity and gender.

That conversation, if it comes, is worth it, according to Dickson. "I think if we could have a hand in creating the idea that a boy can play with a perceived girl toy and a girl can play with a perceived boy toy, we would have contributed to a better, more sensitive place of perception in the world today," he says. "And even more so for the kids that find themselves in that challenging place, if we can make that moment in their life a bit more comfortable, and knowing we created something that makes them feel recognized, that's a beautiful thing."

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(Bloomberg) –– Adam Neumann, the charismatic entrepreneur who led WeWork to become one of the world's most valuable startups, is stepping down as chief executive officer, said a person briefed on the decision, after a plan to take the company public hit a wall.

Members of WeWork's board have been pressuring Neumann in recent days to step aside, taking a new role as non-executive chairman and help salvage an IPO.

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They built him up. And now they want to bring him down.

SoftBank's sudden turn against WeWork CEO Adam Neumann highlights how the Japanese conglomerate has wielded far more dollars than sense in its investment strategy. Officials tied to SoftBank want Neumann to step down as CEO, according to reports over the weekend.

SoftBank and its Vision Fund are WeWork's biggest investors, with a stake of around 29% in We Co., the company's official name. That support is a key reason why this real-estate rental company fetched a $47 billion valuation.

To SoftBank, WeWork was a unicorn on the rise. Its corporate peccadilloes, which largely revolve around corporate governance, appear to have been ignored by executives at the Japanese company: WeWork was a unicorn and SoftBank just had to be part of it. So SoftBank kept pouring in more money, just as it did with other great startups like Uber Technologies Inc., Didi Chuxing and Slack Technologies Inc. At one point SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son described WeWork as the next Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. in reference to the fortune he made from investing in Jack Ma's Chinese e-commerce giant.

It wasn't until WeWork filed its IPO prospectus in August that the rest of the world saw in clear daylight what SoftBank's common sense-radar had failed to detect when it signed each check. As my colleague Shira Ovide wrote at the time, the list of "transactions involving a company's CEO or other insiders is astonishing for WeWork."

Among them: Neumann's wife is one of two or three people who get to choose a successor if he is incapacitated; the CEO owns stakes in some of the office buildings that WeWork leases; and at least two members of Neumann's family did work for the company's Creator Awards, which its biggest outside shareholder committed $180 million to fund.

That outside shareholder is none other than SoftBank – a stark reminder that Masayoshi Son and his team not only knew of these dealings, it actively enabled them.

Because these red flags have spooked other investors, WeWork is looking more like it'll fetch $15 billion when it eventually lists. So now SoftBank cares, to the tune of a $9 billion lower value on its stake. It's too late to exit WeWork. But it's not too late to exit Neumann.

Comparisons to Uber are inevitable. Co-founder Travis Kalanick faced numerous complaints about his erratic management style and questionable judgment. SoftBank's entry into into the ride-hailing giant's capitalization table was part of the solution to a problem. Son bought out a lot of Kalanick's stake, giving other shareholders and board members leverage to push out the CEO and replace him.

In WeWork's case, it may be that Son himself is wielding the cutlass. According to CNBC, his maneuver is seen by some as part of an effort to stop a planned IPO altogether. Last week I discussed why halting the IPO might be good for SoftBank.

Just as a new CEO helped revive sentiment toward Uber, and prepare it for a successful IPO, Son is likely betting that simply getting rid of Neumann and pretending that will fix things should be enough to juice the valuation when a listing does eventually happen. And should installing a new CEO result in, say, a $25 billion valuation instead of $15 billion, then that would be a $3 billion win for SoftBank.

Yet this recent maneuvering by SoftBank suggests the concern isn't WeWork's funky corporate structure, but that public-market investors don't like this funky corporate structure. It's like a kid not being sorry for dipping his hand in the cookie jar, but for getting caught.

It tells us also that SoftBank is tone deaf. WeWork's structure should have raised red flags even before it decided to pump billions into the company. It could have gone straight to Neumann and the existing board and pushed for change, because that's the kind of power a big stack bully with a $100 billion checkbook wields.

Instead, it looks like SoftBank's biggest concern was the Vision Fund's much-vaunted internal rate of return.

It's very possible this WeWork saga will be a wake-up call to SoftBank. Maybe now they'll be clear-sighted enough to spot landmines before they hit them – instead of boldly barreling down the unicorn highway in the belief that speed negates any need for caution.

But with plans for a second $100 billion Vision Fund, prospective investors will be asking if they want to bet on it.

(Bloomberg) — Some WeWork directors are planning to push Adam Neumann to step down as chief executive after the startup delayed its much-anticipated initial public offering, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Officials tied to SoftBank Group Corp., the company's largest investor, want Neumann to step down as CEO of We Co., WeWork's parent company, said the person, who asked not to be identified because discussions are ongoing.

A representative for WeWork declined to comment. Representatives from SoftBank didn't immediately respond for requests seeking comment.

The Wall Street Journal first reported the activities of the WeWork boardmembers.

A board meeting could come as early as this week and they'll consider a proposal for Neumann to stay on as We's non-executive chairman. The company, which has raised more than $12 billion since its founding and never turned a profit, has said it intends to go public in October.

— With assistance from Gillian Tan.

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Colt will stop producing AR-15 rifles for consumers, the Connecticut-based gunmaker announced Thursday.

In a statement, Colt's CEO Dennis Veilleux said the decision to suspend production was entirely market-driven. The statement made no mention of the mass shootings that involved the style of semi-automatic weapon, which include the Sandy Hook and Parkland tragedies. And though neither of the firearms in those two shootings were manufactured by Colt, the gunmaker did own the patent for the design of the widely popular AR-15 until it expired in the 1970s, when other companies could begin making and selling similar types of weapon.

"The fact of the matter is that over the last few years, the market for modern sporting rifles has experienced significant excess manufacturing capacity," he said, while also emphasizing that the company "is committed to the Second Amendment."

The gunmaker also cited a need to focus its manufacturing capabilities on outstanding contracts with military and law enforcement groups.

"Currently, these high-volume contracts are absorbing all of Colt's manufacturing capacity for rifles," Veilleux wrote.

Despite their statement, experts wonder whether the company made the decision with other factors in mind.

"The public is getting very alarmed about what's happening with assault rifles in the hands of potential mass shooters," John Donohue, a Stanford Law professor with expertise in gun policy, tells TIME. "Colt may just be feeling better to get out of that particular market, and they're offering this purely economic manufacturing argument rather than addressing the political realities right now as the justification for this decision."

AR-15-style rifles were used in the mass shootings that took place at Sandy Hook Elementary in 2012, an Aurora, Colo., movie theater in 2012, the Vegas Harvest music festival in 2017 and Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018. The Las Vegas gunman had several Colt rifles among the 24 guns found in his hotel rooms. The guns used in the other shootings were made by other manufacturers.

Timothy Lytton, author of Suing the Gun Industry and a law professor at Georgia State University, has a similar view to Donohue.

"They don't want to be associated with a gun that's becoming increasingly viewed as a shabby crime gun, when their brand is supposed to be bigger," he says. "The danger for them in this—and this is something that they're well aware of in their messaging, is that when gun companies tend to respond to this sort of pressure, there's a huge backlash from the gun rights community."

Following pressure from gun control advocates, some retailers have risked losing gun rights proponents as customers while they take steps to enhance their safety policies. National chains including Walmart, CVS, Walgreens, Publix and Kroger all asked customers to stop openly carrying firearms inside their stores after gunmen killed more than 30 people at an El Paso, Texas, Walmart and in a Dayton, Ohio, entertainment district less than 24 hours apart last month. Dick's Sporting Goods also announced it would remove firearms from 125 of its retail locations. (The company had already banned the sale of assault-style weapons after the Parkland shooting.)

Public opinion shows widespread support for stronger gun safety measures too: 81% of Americans now favor requiring background checks for gun buyers in order to curtail mass shootings, and nearly 60% of respondents said they favored banning "assault weapons," according to a recent HuffPost/YouGov poll.

But those percentages are likely much, much lower among Colt's customer base. And the last time Colt tried to make the industry a little safer by designing a firearm that could only be unlocked and fired by a user wearing a radio-frequency wristband, the plan backfired. Consumers began to worry whether the innovation would affect what kind of firearms they could purchase in the future. "There was a lot of pressure in the gun rights community against these sorts of weapons," Lytton said.

Now Colt, like other gun makers, has to balance pressures from both gun control advocates and its customers. Though the gunmaker says it has been "a stout supporter of the Second Amendment for over 180 years, remains so, and will continue to provide its customers with the finest quality firearms in the world," its full reasoning for ending the production of AR-15 rifles for civilians might be a tad more complicated than that.

"This is a sort of delicate dance," says Lytton, "to sort of walk that thin line between pressure on both sides of this debate."

President Donald Trump says his latest move to roll back California's state-level car regulations is going to make cars cheaper and help automakers. But car companies say they don't want lower standards and experts warn that the changes could even harm automakers who have made major investments in new, green technology.

Speaking at the Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday, the President announced the elimination of a rule that allows California to set stricter gas mileage standards. The policy shift could have profound implications for the American auto industry. California has more vehicles on the road than any other state. Additionally, a dozen other states and Washington, D.C. follow their emissions guidelines.

The Trump Administration argues that the new policy is both consumer and business friendly, and will make cars cheaper and safer while standardizing the industry.

"Many more cars will be produced under the new and uniform standard, meaning significantly more JOBS, JOBS, JOBS! Automakers should seize this opportunity because without this alternative to California, you will be out of business," Trump wrote on Twitter Wednesday. The U.S. Justice Department is also conducting an antitrust investigation into a deal between California and four major automakers to lower emissions standards, according to the Associated Press.

However, industry experts say that the President's view is short-sighted.

Carmakers have already made major changes to their factories in order to meet the guidelines. Experts say that the Trump administration's changes will disrupt the companies' production plans, which are years in the making, and make it hard to plan beyond what's likely to be a protracted legal battle between the administration and blue states – and the 2020 election, says Professor Peter Adriaens of the University of Michigan.

"They're going to be thrown into disarray. The question is where are all these investments going to go?" says Adriaens.

The Motor & Equipment Manufacturers Association (MEMA), which represents manufacturers of vehicle components, said in statement on Wednesday that it is concerned that Trump's policy could harm the automobile industry's competitiveness. MEMA said that the revocation of the waiver will lead to "lengthy litigation" and "will contribute to on-going regulatory uncertainty, which could have damaging effects on industry's ability to invest and plan for the future and impact industry's ability to grow jobs."

MEMA noted that it has urged the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the EPA to come to an agreement with California.

Adriaens says that the changes are also likely to affect the car companies' positions in the stock and capital markets, and possibly make it harder to sell more fuel-efficient cars.

"From a stock-market perspective, where our argument is– look, you're going to be developing all these different kinds of cars. Electric vehicles, hybrid vehicles, more fuel-efficient cars and whatnot," Adriaens says. "Are you sure you're going to be able to recoup all that investment if there is no policy that says you should go towards more fuel efficient cars?"

Ultimately, Adriaens says, companies may be forced to develop and build two fleets of cars – one for the United States, and one for everywhere else – which will be much less efficient.

"What legislation does, is it nudges innovation," says Adriaens. "It makes total sense from a global market perspective. It just seems that the administration wants the U.S. to be a very different market from the global car market."

And industry experts say that President Trump's policy could ultimately make the American car industry much less competitive in a world that is moving towards more fuel-efficient vehicles. Automakers and American workers may be left behind as green jobs and factories move overseas.

Although the policy will encourage Americans to keep buying large cars and to take advantage of the country's low gas prices, the rest of the world is moving towards more efficient cars, Susan Helper, a professor at Case Western University and the a former chief economist at the U.S. Department of Commerce under President Obama, tells TIME. Ultimately, that means that companies will have an incentive to move factories and some of the best jobs overseas, where they can be closer to the people who are purchasing them.

She warns that the policy may lead to "less innovation and less competitiveness for automakers competing in other markets that do have more sensible gas prices" and push future green jobs overseas.

Helper says that this policy rewards companies for engaging in "irresponsible behavior" such as investing in less fuel-efficient vehicles, or slowing down production of environmentally-friendly vehicles in the United States

Helper argues that the policy will ultimately be a "disaster for having innovative green jobs in the U.S." and potentially leave the U.S. manufacturers behind China, which is investing heavily in electric cars.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has promised to take legal action against the changes.

"I'm confident we will prevail eventually. It will take years and years and years, more uncertainty more anxiety," Newsom said, according to the LA Times.