Maybe Peloton is its own worst enemy

For years — through its pandemic-fueled highs and its post-quarantine malaise — Peloton has held its earnings calls at a bright and bushy 8:30AM ET. Not yesterday. Instead, the company broke different news first thing in the morning: it issued yet another recall for 833,000 of its original Bike Plus units, before posting its Q1 2026 results after the markets closed at 4 o’clock.

Peloton CEO Peter Stern addressed the recall right away during the company’s earnings call, stating the facts — that there were only three reports of breakages and two injuries, plus the company was offering a free replacement seat. Later, when asked in an Q&A with analysts, Stern said that the recall’s impact “is expected to be immaterial and is reflected in our full-year guidance.”

In fairness, the scale of this one is smaller than the company’s first seat post recall in 2023, which affected over 2 million original Peloton Bikes with 35 reports of breakages and 13 injuries. But nevertheless, it still cast a shadow over what was otherwise a positive earnings call for the company. Peloton surprised investors by beating expectations with a second consecutive profitable quarter and a bullish forecast for the holiday season. Shares closed up 14 percent today.

But that’s sort of Peloton’s thing. It does something promising — good, even. And then Mr. Big dies. Maybe it launches an insensitive holiday commercial. Prices get hiked and its diehard fans feel nickel and dimed. It announces yet another recall. Or another round of layoffs after vowing layoffs were done. Either way, the Peloton story has become a constant push-pull between progress and the company shooting itself in the foot.

All of this makes it hard to say what Peloton’s future looks like. On the one hand, executives seem confident that the recent ambitious hardware refresh and foray into AI-powered fitness features is going to help the company pedal its way back to the glory days. (If they weren’t, it’d be even more audacious to price the Tread Plus at close to $7,000.) On the other hand, Peloton fans seem divided.

The new products, announced on October 1, triggered intense emotions in subreddits and the official Peloton Facebook group. Many long-time users are irked that there’s no trade-in program or upgrade kits for the bike’s new display. It feels doubly egregious when the new hardware is essentially the same machine with a new tablet affixed to it. You don’t have to dig too deep for the Peloton defenders, but it’s hard to categorize the announcement as a “solid win” within the community. And if that’s how the long-time diehards feel, where exactly is Peloton getting its confidence from?

The longer trend has been a slow and gradual trek toward recovery. Since former CEO John Foley stepped down, there’s been exponentially fewer gaffes, petulant patent fights, and overall drama. One could argue that it took subsequent CEO Barry McCarthy’s roughly two-year reign (and a baffling ship metaphor) to staunch the bleeding. Stern, the current CEO, has signaled that his strategy is to focus on restoring profitability, improving cash flow, and zeroing in on efficiency so the beleaguered company can think about growth again.

It’s frankly boring. Whereas McCarthy — like his predecessor Foley — could be counted on to say something out of pocket here and there, Stern has been about as enthusiastically bland as a CEO can be. (He ended yesterday’s call with a corny joke about a “veritable buffet” of new content for Thanksgiving.) Perhaps that’s what Peloton has needed all along: to have adults at the helm so that the company can be boring for once.

Because that’s always been the most baffling part of the Peloton story. The company has consistently had a winning formula of a good product and a loyal subscriber base. That it fell as fast and hard as it did was, despite the end of pandemic lockdowns, because Peloton couldn’t get out of its own way. Given the timing of yesterday’s recall and earnings call, I don’t think Peloton’s quite ready to fully give up its dramatic flourish just yet. But for fans and investors alike, a day where Peloton headlines don’t automatically induce anxiety would be a relief indeed.