Mirakl’s 2024 Marketplace and Dropship Index is out today and it’s packed with interesting stats across retailer led marketplaces.
Mirakl’s analysis covered 118 global retail marketplaces and dropship platforms. Altogether, these retailers represent more than $6 billion in marketplace and dropship sales, more than 66,000 third-party sellers, and just under 200 million unique products.
- Marketplace merchandise sales grew by 46% on average in 2023, six times overall ecommerce growth
- Average marketplace commission rates were 14.7% (up slightly on 14.1% in 2022)
- Highest commission in jewellery (20-25%) and sporting goods (15-20%), compared to 6-10% in consumer electronics
- Product range continues to grow – total product numbers increase by 45% in 2023
- 70% of customers prefer to shop with specialised retailers
More retailers are reaching shoppers through the platform economy, expanding their offerings by partnering with third-party sellers and suppliers. These platforms, which include retailers like B&Q, Maisons du Monde, Macy’s, and Galeries Lafayette, grew at six times the overall ecommerce rate in 2023, with gross merchandise sales increasing by 46%.
– Mirakl
Major Marketplace and Dropship Trends
The Marketplace and Dropship Index uncovers three major trends shaping the retailer owned platform economy. Perhaps the biggest is that generalist platforms such as Amazon and eBay aren’t growing anywhere as near the pace of the new breed of brand and retailer led marketplaces.
- Retailers are looking for new ways to drive growth and maintain margins as profitability pressures become the new norm
- As the platform model becomes more popular among operators and sellers, and more retailers and brands become sellers themselves, the importance of quality seller onboarding is growing
- As customer push for more personalised shopping experiences, curated platforms are gaining ground against their more generalist competitors, with some industries seeing growth as high as 74%
Mirakl found that average commission rates across marketplaces remained relatively consistent from 2022 (14.1%) to 2023 (14.7%), ranging from 6% for consumer electronics to 25% for higher-margin items like luxury apparel and jewelry.
Additionally, some retailers are also doubling down on dropship, which allows them to expand assortment while maintaining control over certain aspects of their product catalogue, such as pricing.
The advantage of a marketplace is that for items with low profit margins, allowing third party sellers to supply on your marketplace can bring in higher revenues through commissions. Marketplace operators are still under margin pressure and that’s why Retail Media with margins as high as 70-90% is so attractive.
Retail Media
Perhaps unsurprisingly seeing as they have launched a Retail Media offering, Mirakl’s report says that due to pressures on margins, which extends beyond simply improving margins through marketplace and dropship sales, online retailers are exploring ways to establish new revenue streams and that includes Retail Media.
There are two sides to Retail Media (often known as sponsored or promoted products/listings) on marketplaces. From one side for the third party seller, it can look like an ultimatum where your product simply won’t gain visibility at the top of search if you don’t pay to play. However, in more enlightened implementations Retail Media is perhaps the best way to get time sensitive promotions and relevant products in front of a customer when they are showing high shopping intent, driving high conversion rates.
