Vinted on Expanding Beyond Europe

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00:00Let's talk about the numbers. Look, you're up by 25% on the top line. Where is that growth

00:04coming from? What's the message that a 25% top line increase tells us about what is happening

00:09at Vinted? Yeah, so it's actually a plan coming together that we set out many years before. We've

00:16built three different businesses, which is the marketplace business, the shipping business,

00:20and the Vinted pay business. And we see that all these three vectors we are now accelerating.

00:25So the marketplace has been accelerating because Germany has been doing very well. We fixed that

00:29market as one of our biggest growth drivers right now. And at the same time, we've expanded into

00:33new categories. And then with Vinted Go, our shipping solution, we've expanded to the fifth

00:38market. And we see that the other markets are really progressing very well as well. And Vinted

00:42Pay, our payment solution, has been scaling onto our members in the last months, which also helps

00:48us to drive costs down and bring revenue up. In terms of the move into the United States,

00:54what happens with that? Does that turbocharge the kind of growth we're seeing once you

00:59make that stick? What does it look like? Will it stick?

01:01So obviously, the U.S. is a massive market. And we've been very successfully now in Europe. And

01:07we've built it for like nine years in a row to really build that foundation to be able to get

01:11good economics, deep growth curves, and penetrate that second-hand market to a completely new level.

01:16And with that knowledge, we now see that the U.S. market is actually very immature. So all the

01:20players that are there are kind of struggling. And the penetration level of second-hand is actually

01:24very low. So for us, that is a huge opportunity. Yet every market and every continent is different.

01:30So we started now. As of Monday, we will connect London with New York. So finally, New Yorkers will

01:35have a very tasteful European fashion that they can buy second-hand. And we'll start testing. So we have a very

01:42analytical, cost-conscious approach where we have all kinds of phases we go through to test and see if the

01:46market is ready to see if in the next year we'll lean in with bigger investments to develop this market.

01:51But it's a huge opportunity. And we're carefully testing as we are launching and testing every

01:56year in multiple markets. So let's see how that goes. But definitely a big opportunity if that plays

02:01out well for us.

02:03Kuri, do you agree with him? Better European fashion?

02:06I mean, I hate to say it. I think he's right. I think the Europeans have the edge on the Americans

02:11when it comes to fashion. But, you know, Europe versus New York? I don't know. But, Thomas,

02:15I'm glad you brought up New York. As a New Yorker myself, I'm going to claim that title.

02:19Well, there's already a player in New York, a pretty big one on the Upper East Side. It's called the RealReal.

02:24They're expanding across the board when it comes to luxury resale specifically. What is the RealReal not doing

02:30that Vinted can?

02:32So the RealReal is a great example of a good company that is doing second-hand and are doing that in luxury.

02:39And they're very focused on, let's say, they have their shops, brick and mortar, and bringing that quality

02:44and authentication that people love in New York. And I think they're really speaking well to a certain

02:49segment. But what Vinted does is that we're building a proposition that makes second-hand accessible

02:55for anybody. Any type of second-hand goods, whether it's regular fashion or electronics, adapters,

03:02mobile phones, we can bring anything to you at a very low price with very high sell-through rates.

03:08So we're a platform that is built for anybody, not just for luxury. And that gives the opportunity

03:14for many people to join and practically be this mass-market proposition that enables people

03:19to buy and sell things. So what we've seen in Europe is that there were many players in all the

03:25different countries, all kinds of luxury players, but also low-value players in many different forms,

03:31more the ones who are authenticating, more the ones who have shops, all kinds of different players.

03:36Well, we've seen every time we enter a market, we completely grow the market. So the other players

03:41stay in that market in the same way and continue to grow, but we completely grow the total market

03:46because the total addressable market grows, because we bring a proposition that has way lower cost

03:50and much more value than what the other propositions are.

03:55Well, Thomas, as part of your expansion to the United States, I think what's really interesting,

03:59what seems to be the edge that you're bringing about is that connection to the UK market. So

04:02it's ultimately a UK seller can find a American customer and vice versa. But my question to you

04:08is how does that affect your profitability, your margins? Because anyone who shipped anything into

04:13the UK has to pay a massive fee on it. And now you're starting to see the same policies in the

04:18States as well. Don't you get hit on the shipping? Yeah, of course. So that's not a long-term solution.

04:24Yet it is a part of a longer-term strategy that works very well for us in many,

04:28many different countries. So we've always used well-working countries on the back of that

04:32launch new countries. So you bring the liquidity of that well-working country, for example, France

04:37into the Belgium market, kickstart that market, and then let that market on itself later on thrive

04:44and have perfect cost and profitability margins. So it is a kickstart strategy that has worked for us

04:49in 26 other markets that we're now applying, let's say, with the New York-London connection.

04:54So, yeah, obviously, we're not going to, in the future, continue to subsidize U.S.-U.K. shipping.

05:01You're in Vilnius. You're in Lithuania. You're the country's first kind of major unicorn.

05:06And I'm wondering what exposure in the United States is going to do to change the nature of

05:11people's perceptions of the business. U.S. investors are going to take a serious look at you guys.

05:16And I'm just kind of wondering if the move into the States has other implications as well in terms

05:21of where you see the business going, not in terms of kind of where you're going to sell, but where

05:27the business itself is going. Does this, if you do well in the States, does it make an IPO more likely?

05:33Does it make a U.S. IPO more likely? How does this, how does the exposure to the U.S. change Vinted?

05:39So, I think it's a fundamental change if a market like the U.S. works, because if you have Europe

05:45and you have the U.S., then you can really be a global player. And the sad reality is that in

05:50Europe, we've not built many global players. Spotify has surpassed 100 billion, but that's

05:55the only company that did that, that was started in the last 30 or 50 years. While in the U.S.,

06:01they've built $7 trillion companies. And if we want to thrive as a society in Europe, we need to build

06:08massive companies that contribute well to the tax coffins of our countries and Europe. So, for us,

06:16it is very important to see if we can go on a scale that is beyond Europe, because then we can be

06:21truly a global player, can truly make second and first choice worldwide. And that obviously has

06:27impact on how investors look at us. Because as you expand into a new continent, the time that you can

06:32possibly capture is much bigger. And therefore, the returns on future investments will be better.

06:37So, that is definitely a big part. We've very much chosen to carefully go country by country in

06:44Europe, to build a strong base, to then go outside of Europe also carefully. So, we're making careful

06:49steps now. We're testing, and we're testing in the U.S. as for Monday. And we'll see how things go.

06:55Hopefully, we can make that change, because I really believe Europe needs more global tech companies.

07:01Thomas, just let's take a 30,000-foot view of this, if we can. We've talked a lot about your

07:07business, your ambitions, your expansions. Talk to us about what you're seeing in the data,

07:11in the customers that you serve. What are they responding to? What brands are working? What

07:17kind of sales are you seeing? What are people gravitating to in the various markets that you're

07:21seeing? And are they different? Or is every kind of global consumer kind of veering towards the same

07:26thing? Yeah. So, around fashion, especially when we have a lot of fashion on our platform, there's a

07:31lot of smoke and mirrors and, like, brand thinking that people think that is important. Yet, all across

07:38the world, across all people, we see the same trend. People are very cost-sensitive, and they very much

07:44look forward to make some money out of the clothing that they don't use anymore. So, the monetary driver

07:50is very big for people. Then, a second thing that is incredibly important is that the ease of use

07:54is very high. So, that means selling very quickly, being able to transact very easily, and when all

08:00that happens, that it's all happening safely. So, yes, fashion trends are different in every

08:06different country, and there are all kind of particular trends, but the fundamentals of our

08:09business stay exactly the same, and our strategy is exactly around these fundamentals. So, since the

08:15beginning, I started running this company, we focus on cost efficiency and adding value to our users. So,

08:21we want to be the most cost-efficient, and we want to be the most reliable to our users. And that is

08:26what we focus on, and that has driven the success of the second-hand market for us.

08:31All right. The Vinted Group CEO, Thomas. I got to do it. Plantagna, I'm sorry. I can't even attempt it.

08:38It was lovely having you. Thank you so much on the program.

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