#1 eCommerce Bits & Bites

Did you know?

• The first eCommerce company. In 1982, the world’s first eCommerce company launched. The Boston Computer Exchange (BCE) was an online marketplace for people to buy and sell used computers.
• Early days of Amazon. After only 30 days since its launch, Amazon was shipping books to 45 countries
• The first e-commerce transaction ever. Though Pizza Hut often gets credit for the first e-commerce transaction (they started?selling pizzas online in late August 1994), producers from Shopify trace online shopping to its roots in a short video called "Proceed to Checkout: The Unexpected Story of how Ecommerce Started". The actual credit for the first e-commerce transaction goes to Dan Kohn, a 21-year-old entrepreneur who ran a website based in New Hampshire called NetMarket. On August 11, 1994, Kohn sold a CD of Sting’s?Ten Summoner’s Tales?album to a friend in Philadelphia, who used his credit card to spend $12.48, plus shipping costs, in a transaction that, for the first time ever, was protected by encryption technology.
• Surpassing $1 billion. In 2010, for the first time in online shopping history, U.S. online sales during?Cyber Monday?surpassed?$1 billion.
• Amazon vs eBay. When talking about his experience at Amazon and eBay, the former Director Faisal Masud said that the way decisions were made internally explains Amazon's supremacy over eBay. Faisal describes Amazon as a data-driven company focused on execution: when they need to make a decision, they analyse the data to see what they should do and to find the right time to do it. In comparison, eBay is more focused on consensus than execution. Decision-makers work together to find mutually acceptable solutions. If the entire group isn’t on board with a decision, it won’t move forward.?
• e-Commerce market evolution estimations. In June 2022, forecasts projected that the e-commerce market would grow most significantly in Asia, Australia, and the Americas. Singapore and Indonesia were forecast to exhibit the largest growth. While online retail giants, Alibaba Group and Amazon, dominate the online shopping market globally, they are not the biggest names in many of the fastest-growing e-commerce markets. In terms of monthly website traffic, Singaporean e-retailer Shopee is the leading e-commerce site in Singapore by a significant margin. This trend is even more pronounced in Argentina, where Mercado Libre receives almost ten times the amount of traffic as its nearest competitor, Amazon.
• Cyber bulling. During a January 2021 survey, it was found that 75 percent of online harassment victims in the United States had been cyber bullied via Facebook (and the rest via Instagram and Twitter). During the most recently reported period, Facebook removed 13.5 million pieces of content with hate speech, down from 15.1 million in the first quarter of 2021. There are various reasons why people bully others in the online environment. The most common ones in the United States are political views and physical appearance.?

News:

• Zalando starts selling toys. As of beginning of 2023, the german online fashion giant Zalando has added a new product category to its platform: toys. The new category is already added to the platform’s homepage in all its markets.
• Shopee exits Europe. Shopee, an online marketplace launched in Singapore in 2015, has left Poland. The company launched there just over a year ago. In March of last year, Shopee also pulled the plug on their operations in India and France just months after launching there. The Spanish website is also currently down. When leaving the Indian and French market last year, Shopee said in an announcement the exit happened ‘in view of global market uncertainties’.
• Stop BNPL feature for alcohol. In an attempt to making buying alcohol more difficult, the Dutch government wants online liquor stores to stop offering ‘buy now, pay later’ as a payment method.?It is not the first time for BNPL payment methods to be critiqued. According to a study in 2021,?36 percent of Gen-Z used these payment methods that year, which was a six-fold growth since 2019. Critics are concerned that younger people are more vulnerable to potential debt. According to a study conducted in 2022 by the Financial Markets Authority in Netherlands, up to 6 percent of young people between the ages of 18 and 24 end up in a collection procedure after using this option when buying alcohol.
• Recommerce market evolution. The selling of pre-owned items is growing in popularity. In 2021, the European recommerce market was worth 75 billion euros and it is expected to grow 60 percent by 2025, to 120 billion euros. Lithuanian marketplace Vinted is an example of such a c2c recommerce marketplace (is the biggest European player in this industry), but platforms such as Zalando are also offering added services where customers can sell their pre-owned items. Fashion recommerce was valued at 20 billion euros in 2021 and this is expected to reach 37 billion euros in 2025. According to a study carried out by Cross-Border Commerce Europe, recommerce marketplaces are growing 20 times faster than the overall retail market. Up to 2025, the recommerce market is expected to grow its market share from 10 to 14 percent.

This newsletter is build on audience request. If you have any topic suggestion, please PM me.