(Bloomberg Businessweek) -- The co-founder of e-commerce startup Verishop Inc. says he’s betting the online shopping market still has room for high-end but relatively affordable tastemakers that can survive the wrath of Jeff Bezos.
Do you think about Amazon constantly?
One company cannot solve all problems. If you look at online retail, it’s now 10% of overall retail sales, and I believe that in the next 10 to 15 years, online retail will be 30% of it.
How do you capture some of that slice? You’ve been live for just a few months now. What are you learning about the marketplace?
If you need a commodity, a disposable utility product, Amazon is phenomenal. What’s really missing is a lifestyle e-commerce destination. We are creating a platform where you can find all the cool brands for your everyday luxury needs, and with the convenience of Amazon. Free one-day shipping, and we put our customer support number at the top of the page.
What’s to prevent somebody from going to your site, saying, “OK, I like this XYZ cool brand,” and then going to the home site of that brand in the future?
Some people will do that. The interesting thing is that consumers don’t like putting their credit card number in 500 different websites. So if you have a relationship with one retailer who knows you and the product shows up, that’s a great place to go.
What’s it going to take to fix this chasm between private valuations and public valuations that we saw with WeWork?
A lot of great companies were built in a public market. Amazon went public very early. Netflix went public very early. But I think it’s getting more and more challenging. The market is so volatile, and investors are so short-term-oriented. So I understand the excitement then with private markets.
What sorts of market lessons did you learn at Snap that you’re applying now at Verishop?
If you can build an audience and work with a great team, you can build a business fast. By yearend we’ll have a million unique shoppers a month. I still believe there is an opportunity to build big businesses. Interviews are edited for clarity and length. Listen to Bloomberg Businessweek With Carol Massar and Jason Kelly, weekdays from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m. ET on Bloomberg Radio.
To contact the authors of this story: Carol Massar in New York at cmassar@bloomberg.netJason Kelly in New York at jkelly14@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jeff Muskus at jmuskus@bloomberg.net
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