Fridge startup Tomorrow will not live to see another day.
Last week, founder Andrew Kinzer cited the difficult funding environment for hardware startups and the headwinds around the uncertainty in tariffs in a post on LinkedIn.
I knew this would be a massive challenge. Consumer hardware is notoriously difficult, and solving shelf-life extension would require a scientific leap. I understood then that I could swing and miss, but I always felt that if I did, I could still be proud I gave it a shot.
In the end, though, timing is everything. Right now — maybe more than at any point in the past decade — consumer hardware is a tough sell for investors, and fluctuating tariffs only add more risk to the equation.
The company’s website also features a going-out-of-business message, citing the same reasons Andrew did in his post and thanking those who helped out along the way:
After much consideration, we’ve made the difficult decision to shut down Tomorrow.
When we set out to build a next-generation fridge—one that could extend the life of your fresh produce, reduce waste, and help make healthier eating easier—we knew we were taking on an ambitious challenge.
Unfortunately, the current climate for consumer hardware—especially for capital-intensive, science-forward products like ours—has made it incredibly difficult to bring something like this to life.
Though we won’t be moving forward, we’re deeply proud of the work we did and grateful for the community that rallied around our vision.
To everyone who signed up, supported us, or offered guidance: thank you.
When I first covered Tomorrow last year, I was admittedly excited to see a new company take a shot at reimagining such a moribund category. How we store food hasn’t seen nearly as much innovation around how we grow, cook, shop and make food, and so any new startup taking a shot was a good thing as far as I was concerned.
It’s hard to say whether Tomorrow would have succeeded if they had been able to raise funding, in part because I’m not sure exactly what the company’s key technology differentiation was. That’s because the company kept their product details close to their vest, pointing to its intention to keep fresh food fresher longer, leveraging AI and other technologies when asked about specifics.
I can also say I’m not surprised by the reasoning behind the shutdown. Hardware is a hard category to build a business in normal times. Throw in tariffs, which would no doubt complicate the supply chain and manufacturing strategy of a refrigerator startup, and significantly raise the final price of the product. Creating an entirely new product in this space almost becomes a fool’s errand, at least in the current environment (which is also probably why raising funding for this company proved extremely difficult).
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