RCI’s leadership lap dance: CEO and CFO step off the main stage with a three day goodbye
RCI Hospitality Holdings, the publicly traded strip club empire and owner of Rick’s Cabaret and Bombshells has announced the abrupt departure of CEO Eric Langan and CFO Bradley Chhay.
Recently, the company and several executives, including Langan and Chhay, were indicted by New York state over an alleged long running tax and bribery scheme. NY claims that the company bribed a state official with “Dance Dollars,” to lower its tax burden. RCI and the executives deny the allegations, but the stock has been on a slide all year, shedding 58% of its value.
The timing of the resignations is really odd.
In a normal corporate transition, you’d expect something like:
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“Effective immediately” (emergency mode), or
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“Effective at year-end” (pretend this is totally planned and strategic).
Instead, we got an announcement two days before Thanksgiving to take effect the day after. A November 25th announcement, which goes into effect on November 28th.
The C-suite equivalent of “I’m breaking up with you… on Monday. I still need a ride to the airport.”
In those three days, the company nominally gets to say it still has “continuity” while everyone prints new org charts. Starting November 28:
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Travis Reese (current executive vice president) becomes Interim President and CEO
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Albert Molina (current director of financial reporting) becomes Interim CFO
At the same time, Langan and Chhay do not actually leave the building. They stick around as advisors and keep their compensation structures.
Officially this is a “leadership transition” and the board is bravely “positioning the company for the future.” In reality, it looks like the board wanted to show regulators and investors that it did something about the indicted executives without losing the two people who know every lease, liquor license, side deal, and debt covenants by heart.
So shareholders now get an interim management team up front, two indicted ex officio power brokers in the back, and a three day gap between announcement and effectiveness that screams rushed damage control rather than carefully planned succession.
It is less a clean break and more a costume change. The names on the top line of the org chart are different, but if you squint toward the VIP area, you can see the same familiar faces still running the show.
RCI Hospitality CEO Langan, CFO Chhay Stepping Down From C-Suite Roles
Thanksgiving week massacre at HP: 4,000+ sacrificed to the Mechanical God
HP ($HPQ) will be cutting between 4,000-6,000 jobs in its big Thanksgiving week push (10% of staff) in order to “streamline operations” for its “AI push.” This is on top of 1,000 already affected by cuts last February.
HP says the move will save over $1bil over the next three years.
HP to Cut Up to 10% of Workforce as Part of AI Push
Thanksgiving week layoffs at McKinsey
McKinsey has announced 200 job cuts of tech workers due to AI “enabling unprecedented levels of opportunity and impact for us and our clients.”
Sadly, the Mechanical God couldn’t pick a better week to make this announcement for those impacted workers.
McKinsey Cuts About 200 Tech Jobs, Shifts More Roles to AI
Struggling Six Flags looking to sell underperforming parks; announces new CEO
Amusement park company Six Flags stock is up 7% today on news that the company will be looking to shed its underperforming parks — likely at the behest of a group of activist investors which owns 9% of the company and includes activist investor JANA Partners and Taylor Swift’s husband (and football player) Travis Kelce.
The company separately announced that its outgoing CEO will be replaced by former Palace Entertainment U.S CEO, John Reilly. Palace owns parks mostly in the Northeast including: Splish Splash of Calverton, NY and Dutch Wonderland (!) of Lancaster, PA.
Even with the rise, the stock has absolutely been on a rollercoaster straight down this year:
Six Flags eyes closing more parks after revenue falls during peak summer month
Six Flags Appoints John Reilly President and Chief Executive Officer
Former Campbells Soup employee releases wild tape of company vice president
A former employee is suing Campbell’s (of soup) for wrongful termination after he was allegedly fired for reporting his boss’s wild rant in which he says the company makes “bioengineered meat for poor people.” The fired employee has released audio of Campbell’s Vice President and Chief Information Security Officer Martin Bally making the statements as well as calling the company’s Indian employees idiots who “couldn’t think for their fucking selves.”
We’re trying to get ahold of the full audio, which reportedly goes on for over an hour (!). In the meantime, here is the story by a local Detroit station:
(Archive)
Case information: 25-018465-CD (Garza v. Campbell Soup Company)
‘S--t for f---ing poor people’: Campbell’s employee fired after complaining ab
Intuit’s Sasan Goodarzi makes the post-earnings rounds dressed like Rocky Balboa
Intuit quarterly results are in and they’re good enough where CEO Sasan Goodarzi fels confident enough to wear the most insane outfit we’ve seen in a long time in a CNBC interview. The most baffling part of the twelve minute interview is the fact that at no point did Jon Fortt ask “why the hell are you dressed like that?”
More layoffs at Barbie HQ
Barbie’s house just shrank. Toymaker Mattel is chopping 89 marketing and design jobs at its El Segundo headquarters, starting January 12, 2026, as it carves up its global brands team into a new “brand-centric” structure that’s supposed to save $200 million by 2026. This round is on top of the 120 shed last March. The toymaker says it’s about strategy and efficiency; for the staff laid off, it’s just another round of corporate make-believe where the brands live on and the people get boxed up and sent home.
Mattel laying off 89 workers in brand restructuring
Hats off at Fanatics Tampa distribution center
Sports apparel giant Fanatics is announcing it will shutter its Oak Creek distribution center next year and shift the work to a newer, “more advanced” Tampa facility. The warehouse came with Fanatics’ 2017 Majestic acquisition; now it’s being written off as not up to the company’s latest “scale and innovation” story. Layoffs start March 1 and run through July 31, with workers offered severance, job fairs, and the chance to apply for roles at other Fanatics sites.
Fanatics closing facility near Tampa, laying off 286 employees
Laying (off) Pipe
Once valued at 2 billion, fintech company Pipe is laying off around 50% of its staff. The alternate title was: half-Pipe.
US fintech Pipe drastically reduces workforce, reportedly by 50%
Days after laying off 10%, Vimeo acquired for $1.38 billion
Just one week after CEO Philip Moyer took to Linkedin to spin the company’s decision to axe 10% of its workforce, Vimeo is being sold off. The struggling video platform is getting scooped up by European app developer Bending Spoons in an all-cash deal valued at $1.38 billion.
On paper, the acquisition looks rich: a 70% premium to Vimeo’s battered stock price. But investors who bought into the hype at its 2021 IPO won’t be celebrating. Even with today’s 60% pop, shares are still down nearly 85% from their debut.
For laid-off employees and long-suffering shareholders, the sale feels less like a comeback story and more like the last gasp of a once-hyped platform that never lived up to its promise.
In its article about the acquisition, TechCrunch points out why Vimeo employees shouldn’t be popping champagne for their salvation. Bending Spoons’ playbook is simple—buy broken companies (see: Evernote, WeTransfer) and then slash jobs and features until there’s nothing left but a logo.
Vimeo to be acquired by Bending Spoons in $1.38B all-cash deal
Scope3 snipes an undisclosed number
This company has been in our sights for awhile… Carbon emissions auditor digital advertising middleman Scope3 is laying off an unknown number of employees, and a few are leaving of their own accord according to Adweek.
On the same day the news broke, LinkedIn inflencer company CEO, Brian O’Kelley, took to LinkedIn to post about broken demos and one of his new commercial hires (Archive)…
EXCLUSIVE: Scope3 Lays Off Staff as Part of Shift Toward Agentic Advertising
Rivian sheds 200 in run-up to new car’s launch next year
With a $7,500 tax credit set to expire this month and before the launch of its newer, cheaper SUV (the R2), Rivian is axing 200 employees (~1.5% of its workforce). This is on the heels of a quarter that saw the company lose 1.1 billion, a tremendous acceleration of the $650mm that it burned the quarter before that (and the $660mm the quarter before that). Riv says it has enough cash to see it through to the launch of the R2 in the first half of next year and with 7 bil in the bank, they may be right… for now.
EV Maker Rivian Lays Off Workers as It Preps Launch of Cheaper SUV
Kyte shuts down after sinking $550+ million
Rental car company sputters? Kyte falls out of the sky? What kind of metaphor should I have used to describe the spectacular bust of a company once touted itself as the next Hertz?
As tempting as some NY Post wordplay could have been, the amount of cash that they burned through was just too large to not put in the title.
Oh well. Kyte is now floating its way to the great airport parking lot in the sky.
Kyte, which billed itself as the ‘best competitor to Hertz,’ shuts down
Super Micro threatened with Nasdaq de-listing
Knives falls fast. Last night Super Micro was notified that it faces Nasdaq de-listing if it does not submit a “compliance plan.” That should be easy, they can just tack it on to the earnings report that they must be furiously working on with their brand new auditor…
Super Micro Shares Plummet as Nasdaq Delisting Looms
