Germany

Over 40 percent of online stores close customer care after 5 pm, according to surveys in Germany and the Netherlands. Almost half of German shops are not reachable at night. However, the evenings are a peak time for online shoppers.

Ecommerce fulfillment company Huboo is planning to launch in Germany. The expansion follows a launch in the Netherlands last year. The company was founded in the UK and is also active in Spain.

Berlin Brands Group, which became a unicorn last year, has to let go ten percent of its staff. In total, the German aggregator will fire about a hundred employees. Where ecommerce has grown exponentially during the pandemic, the growth now is slowing down. Instead of aggressive growth, Berlin Brands Group will focus on profitability.

Amazon Fashion Luxury Stores is launching in 5 countries in Europe. The ecommerce giant will offer 8 brands at launch, planning to add more in the future. But the competition for luxury fashion retail in Europe is fierce.

Clearco, an ecommerce investor from Canada, has launched in Germany. The firm pledges 500 million euros to German online businesses. Just three months ago, Clearco set foot in Ireland, where it recently had staff layoffs.

Wonnda, a Berlin-based startup, has launched its online product sourcing platform. Sellers can now use the beta-version. The service offers over a thousand products from European manufacturers in 6 categories.

Trendyol, the ecommerce platform from Turkey, is launching in Germany. It marks the first market outside of Turkey as well as Trendyol’s entry into Europe. The platform also has plans to launch in the Netherlands, Luxembourg and London by next year.

Fashion platform About You has increased revenue to 1.7 billion euros in 2021. At the same time, losses have more than doubled compared to the year before. The company says this is because of growth investments.

Inditex, the major clothing retail group from Spain, is now charging a fixed fee for online returns. The owner of brands such as Zara, Pull & Bear and Bershka is implementing this change in 30 countries. It wants to motivate customers to return items in brick-and-mortar stores.

Octopia Fulfillment, a logistics service provider from France, has announced that it will open new warehouses in the coming months. The company will launch warehouses in the UK and Germany, as an addition to its warehouses that are currently active in France and Spain. The expansion will further solidify the company's logistics network.

Brenger, the Dutch scaleup for sustainable delivery, launches in West Germany. After a pilot in North Rhine-Westphalia last year, Brenger is now available for all western regions. The delivery network expects to execute 5000 transports in Germany in 2022.

Since the war in Ukraine started, online fashion sales in Germany fell 9 percent. Online interior design purchases, which is known as a stable category, also slowed down. Overall, though, ecommerce sales grew 8 percent in the first quarter.

Popular German online pet supply store Zooplus has increased its total sales to 2.09 billion euros in 2021. This is a 16 percent growth when compared to a year before. The company lost market share to Fressnapf, but expects to increase sales to 2.3 billion euros in this year.

German fashion platform About You is launching a new digital fashion platform called Hypewear. In doing so, the company wants to provide the mainstream with fashion NFTs. Upon registration, new customers will receive a free fashion NFT.

Fulfillment startup Warehousing1 has raised more than 10 million euros in seed capital. The logistics company wants to use the money to double its employees. In addition, the Berlin-based business will further develop their fulfillment service.