15,000 offline stores, including convenience stores and supermarkets, and online marketplaces used by 14 million people each month will join forces. In the future, convenience stores and supermarkets are expected to become a hub for local used transactions and’joint purchase’ is also possible. GS Retail and Carrot Market announced on the 9th that they signed a business agreement and started to build a’town platform’ based on the region. GS Retail and Carrot Market’s’Hong-Jong Yeon-Hwan’ is meaningful in that it creates an offline base for online users grouped around local living areas, such as using convenience stores as a second-hand trading place for carrot market users.
The cooperation between the two companies starts with the convenience store GS25 operated by GS Retail and the supermarket GS The Fresh providing discount information to the carrot market in real time. For example, users of the carrot market based in life in Yeoksam-dong, Gangnam-gu, will receive the information that “the convenience store GS25 GS Gangnam is selling triangle kimbap with an imminent expiration date at 50% discount.”
First of all, the carrot market paid attention to the “closed products” of convenience stores and supermarkets that come out at the end of the day. Carrot Market and GS Retail joined forces in finding the owner of fresh food, lunch boxes, snacks, and drinks before the sales deadline reached. The service will start in the’near me’ category in the carrot market application (app) in the second quarter of this year, and will gradually expand the product line starting with simple food products such as lunch boxes and kimbap that have a relatively short shelf life.
Through this, GS Retail plans to reduce waste products and develop them into best practices for environmental, responsible and transparent management (ESG) activities. In addition, to stimulate the local economy, advertisements for jobs and jobs at GS Retail offline stores such as GS25, GS The Fresh, and Lalavla will be posted on the carrot market.
GS Retail plans to transform its offline store from a simple retail store into a lifestyle platform through a partnership with the carrot market. The convenience store GS25 owns 12,000 ATM machines. Used face-to-face transactions at the carrot market usually involve cash, but GS25 has a fee-free agreement with major banks, so there is a lot of room for it to be used as a’transaction base’. In addition, it is expected that non-face-to-face transactions between carrot market users will be possible through GS25’s parcel storage service’Box 25′.
The’discount event’ that was held at GS The Fresh, a supermarket, can also increase the discount range if economies of scale are achieved. GS The Fresh is currently conducting pre-order joint purchases for local consumers such as meat, fruits and vegetables, and fisheries (king crab, etc.) about four times a month for each store. The price is discounted by more than 20% and the number of monthly participating customers is 80,000 to 100,000. The distribution industry predicts that an additional discount of 5% or more will be possible as it can recruit more than twice the number of participants by linking with the local online platform of the carrot market. In fact, GS Retail explained that it has verified the effect of affiliate marketing for each store targeting local customers, such as an increase in GS The Fresh sales through a carrot market advertisement in the second half of last year.
GS Retail is the first large retailer to be joined by the carrot market. Carrot Market is expected to attract investment, expand business, and diversify profitability through collaboration with GS Retail. GS Retail Vice Chairman Huh Yeon-soo said, “This partnership with the carrot market will be a new opportunity for GS Retail’s 15,000 stores to show synergies with the No. 1 regional online platform in Korea.”
According to Carrot Market, carrot market MAU surpassed 14 million as of January. Compared to 4.8 million people in January last year, it nearly tripled in one year. Due to its rapid growth, it attracted 40 billion won investment from Silicon Valley venture capital Altos Ventures and Good Water Capital in 2019, and has secured a total of 48 billion won so far. As follow-up investment discussions are currently taking place, Korea’s 13th’Unicorn’ is expected to be smooth. Through this alliance, the carrot market will put more emphasis on its strategy to expand its business area, which was concentrated only on’used trade,’ to all lifestyle-related fields of local residents. In addition, as the partnership with GS Retail, which has local-based offline stores such as convenience stores and supermarkets, has been added, it is possible to create a stronger community-oriented community for the carrot market than before.
The carrot market is expected to diversify its profitability through the partnership with GS Retail. It is also possible to predict how GS Retail will give a certain portion of the transaction amount to the carrot market.
Kim Jae-hyun, co-CEO of Carrot Market, said, “Based on this partnership with GS Retail, we are expected to realize the value of online connection and environmental protection of the local community that the carrot market draws.” I will give it to you.”
[김기정 기자 / 김태성 기자]
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