Ever since Elon Musk bought Twitter in October 2022, the social media company has stopped paying certain bills amid a huge cost-cutting program led by its new owner. Based on publicly available information, Twitter is at least hundreds of thousands of dollars behind on office rent, private jet fees and, as a new lawsuit reveals, bills for luxury gift boxes ordered for Musk personally.
Canary Marketing, a San Ramon, Calif.-based marketing company, said Twitter ordered a nearly $7,000 swag box in September for Musk to deliver to its San Francisco office but hasn’t paid the invoice, according to a previously unreported lawsuit filed in January.
The box contained a bottle of Nikka Japanese whiskey worth $689, $215 worth of cheese, an engraved cheese board, a rocket-shaped cocktail shaker and a moon ice mold, according to Business Insider. Other unpaid-for items included
About a month before Twitter ordered the swag box, Musk revealed in a Twitter chat that whiskey is his favorite alcoholic beverage.
Twitter was originally given until Feb. 24 to respond to Canary’s complaint, but the company said it needed “several more weeks to investigate the allegations,” according to a court filing on Feb. 16. Its new deadline to respond is now March 17, according to the filing.
Canary claims it has delivered more than $10 million worth of Twitter-branded merchandise since 2013 and Twitter stopped paying its invoices in September 2022.
Shortly after taking over Twitter, Musk reportedly directed his finance team to stop paying vendors until he has personally reviewed each expense.
Musk ordered Twitter employees to return to the office full time but refused to pay office rent. In December, Twitter was sued in California for not paying $136,000 in rent for its San Francisco headquarter office.
It also didn’t pay rent for its international offices. In January, employees at Twitter’s Asia-Pacific headquarters in Singapore were evicted over unpaid rent.
Also in December, Twitter was sued by a private jet service provider for refusing to pay $200,000 for flights used by employees approved by Musk’s previous management.
It is unclear if any of these bills have since been paid. Twitter didn’t respond to a request for comment.