The Digitally-Enabled Local Business: Transitioning OfferUp’s Platform from C2C to B2C (feat. CEO Nick Huzar)

Local commerce is making a comeback and the digital realm is crucial to its success. OfferUp strives to create a platform that enables anyone to buy and sell locally. Nick Huzar, CEO of OfferUp joins the show to discuss how they're evolving with local commerce.The Potential for Secondhand CommerceNick loves to build and create things. While having a baby on the way, he needed to clear a room and was frustrated at the time and effort it would take to sell his belongings. The idea for OfferUp sparked.When he started OfferUp in 2011, there was no Android phone - but there was the belief that everyone would have smartphones.He began OfferUp slowly with a lot of research, finding out that 25% of U.S. households with a two car garage can’t park in their garage and 10% of the population rents storage units.OfferUp has become effectively the fastest growing marketplace in the U.S. OfferUp has been installed over 90 million times.Nick says that OfferUp is really a platform for local commerce but has many phases in its evolution: “Today, I think the primary use case of OfferUp is definitely peer to peer, [but] long term it definitely doesn’t have to be. We have a growing segment of stores that are using OfferUp as both online commerce and local commerce.” - Nick Huzar“Early on, we moved to more of a C2C approach with the idea that if we could get consumers to use the product, then we would have a huge base of users that we could then layer on other businesses. C2C was very intentional.” - Nick HuzarNick says that OfferUp has been focused on simplicity and product experience to bring trust and because of that, OfferUp’s growth has mostly been word of mouth.During COVID, OfferUp saw a 90% increase in overall engagement - nonessentials like fashion trending downwards, but fitness equipment and entertainment spiking.Customer Acquisition for Local BusinessesLocal businesses have a more difficult time getting in front of customers due to their lower budgets for advertising.Local car dealerships have been offered a monthly subscription in return for special detail pages, badges in their profile, increased promotions, and analytics to see what’s working and what’s not.The challenge with local businesses was that the initial app was designed for an individual to use to sell items, so OfferUp has helped redesign to accommodate having thousands of items and the ability to plug in their CMS system.OfferUp wants to create more tools for local entrepreneurs to use to get their products on the platform.C2C During COVID-19 & the Acquisition of LetGoCustomers have been more accommodating during COVID, realizing that buying/selling C2C comes with less exposure than going to a physical store.Customers are trusting each other more with in person exchanges and OfferUp’s shipping option is up 100% statistically.It’s unfortunate, but many people have liquidated items in their home to help with financial stress during COVID. Nick is happy that they’ve created a service that can help with that.“This is a perfect example of how commerce connects people and demonstrates that people still have the ability to interact with each other in good ways in crisis.” - Brian LangeLetGo and OfferUp had different markets where they were doing well, so they decided to come together to offer a more cohesive service and accelerate growth as a unified marketplace.The Future of Peer to Peer CommerceOfferUp’s focus has always been on removing friction in the buying/selling experience as possible.There’s a lot of opportunity left in local commerce from moving goods to payments, and there’s plenty OfferUp wants to do in helping professionals get integrated into the platform.“We want to be a platform that enables anybody to be able to buy and sell things locally. It can be a business. It can be an individual.” - Nick HuzarLinksCheck out Future Commerce Insiders #033: We’re All Retailers, NowCheck out OfferUp, available on all smart devices. If you have any comments or questions about this episode, you can reach out to us at [email protected] or any of our social channels. We love hearing from our listeners! Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.