Since launching in Ireland 18 months ago, refurbished goods online marketplace Refurbed has grown steadily, and now claims to have sold products to 2% of Irish households.
The company, founded by Peter Windischhofer, Kilian Kaminski and Jürgen Riedl in Vienna five years ago, started off selling smartphones, and has since expanded its range to include laptops, tablets, wearables, and audio products.
Most recently, the marketplace has started gaming consoles, and kitchen/household appliances, including robot vacuums, and as the first such platform in Ireland, Refurbed envisages itself as a competitor to the likes of Amazon and eBay as well as smaller outfits such as CEX.
Refurbed also sells clothing and sports equipment in German-speaking markets and Pádraig Power, the company's marketing manager in Ireland, said there's "definitely a long-term goal" for the Irish site to spread into more categories beyond its "bread and butter" of electronics.
A native of Co Limerick, Power is a UCC neuroscience graduate and opted, after a year living in France, to do a masters degree in marketing, working as marketing manager for the Health Services Staff Credit Union before joining Refurbed.
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Power is Refurbed's only employee in Ireland, although the company has four Irish employees in Vienna.
He has responsibility for sourcing products and partner companies to sell their products through the platform. Refurbed employs 260 people in total.
He estimates that there are five to 10 Irish merchants who sell through Refurbed, and says that the company has planted around 46,000 trees in Ireland - one for every product sold on the site.
"When we started, we wanted to enter the market with a good value proposition for our customers," Power says. "Since then, we're continuously expanding. At the start of the year, we reached a milestone of being in 1% of Irish households, and now we're in about one in 50 Irish households," he claims.
"Aside from that, we're seeing consistent stats now where one in four customers are actually referred by family and friends, One in five buyers are returning customers.
In terms of securing merchant partners for the platform, Power says Refurbed integration tools make it easy for retailers to sell on the site, and the company tries to include them in campaigns and give them a transparent overview of the market.
"It generally seems to be the case that merchants might start by putting a little bit of stock up and see what happens. Then they tend to add more and make Refurbed a core part of their business."
Coming into the fourth quarter and the all-important Christmas shopping season, Power says Refurbed expects a pick-up in sales over the coming months, with the marketplace having added a very limited selection of kitchen and household appliances recently.
The company recently appointed Jonny Ng as Chief Marketing Officer. Ng (38) was previously responsible for Zalando's global marketing strategy and communications between 2018 and 2021.
He is the second executive to be appointed from Zalando after Maria Rupprechter joined the company as Director of Supply in April 2022.
Windischhofer described Ng as “the missing link” in the leadership team.
“His diverse set of values, his high standards and his international background are a perfect fit for our corporate philosophy,” he said.
Before launching in Ireland, Refurbed had completed a $17m Series A round and last year completed a $54m Series B round.
Going forward, Power says Refurbed plans to broaden its product portfolios, and there's a general effort to make the same products and services available in all its markets - Austria, Germany, Italy, France, Sweden, the Netherlands, Denmark and Ireland.
Photo: Pádraig Power.
