Posts by Jasmijn

Action, the discount retailer from the Netherlands, is launching its online store in Belgium. The online shop is available in Dutch and French. Action will offer around 150 products. The product range mostly consists of large items such as garden furniture.

Bol.com, the leading marketplace in the Netherlands and Belgium, had a gross merchandise volume of 1.3 billion euros in Q1. As much as 65 percent comes from third party merchants on the platform. Bol.com currently has 52,000 partners.

The Otto Group is partnering with Covariant, a company specializing in AI-driven warehouse robots. With the partnership, Otto wants to automate its fulfilment activities and increase its operational efficiency. Otto's German fulfilment locations will be robotized first.

Dutch payment service iDeal has been acquired by the European Payments Initiative (EPI), a collaboration of European banks. Payconiq, technology provider of iDeal and Belgian payment platform Bancontact, has also been taken over. iDeal is to form the basis of a Europe-wide payment system, according to EPI.

Ecommerce aggregator Razor Group has taken over German competitor Stryze Group, another acquisition company. The deal was made with shares only. In addition, Razor Group has raised 80 million euros of funding.

In German ecommerce, online sales of goods fell 15 percent in the first quarter of 2023. This is mostly the case for fashion items. On the other hand, sales of digital services such as holiday bookings increased by over 28 percent. The food segment remained stable.

Amazon increased the costs of its multi-channel fulfilment service. The new fees will be in effect for European sellers starting next month. According to the ecommerce giant, the increase is due to rising operational costs due to inflation.

German bicycle e-tailer Bike24 is launching in Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. The company already had localized online shops for Germany, Austria, France, Italy and Spain. Bike24 says the company now reaches 70 percent of the European market.

From now on, fashion e-tailer About You only offers free shipping with a minimum order amount of 30 euros. Customers with smaller orders will have to pay 4,90 euros delivery costs. The new fees are already in effect in Germany, but will eventually be introduced in all markets.

Fashion marketplace Saclàb has raised 1.6 million euros in seed funding. The company wants to use the capital for product development as well as HR and marketing activities. The platform is also planning a launch in the United States.

Patchworks has raised 4 million pounds (4.4 million euros) in growth capital. The ecommerce integration platform wants to use the funds to enhance its product offering. The company also hired Jim Herbert from BigCommerce as their new CEO.

Zalando saw its earnings before interest more than halve last year. The platform’s sales increased slightly by 3 percent compared to a 34 percent growth in 2021. After a tough year, the fashion giant predicts revenue could shrink in 2023.

In the FT 1000-ranking of fastest-growing European companies, 95 are ecommerce businesses. The vast majority of these companies is from Germany, such as WLDOHO and KoRo. Italy (24) and France (12) are also well-represented.

Barcelona’s City Council aims for 40 percent of online purchases to be delivered to pick-up points instead of at home in 2023. To achieve this, Barcelona introduced an annual tax for logistics companies that offer home delivery.

Used cars retailer Autohero.com generated 1 billion euros in sales in 2022. That is an increase of over 80 percent compared to the year before. This is mostly due to raising prices of used cars following supply chain shortages.