After Keller Sports, another online pure player is disappearing from the market: As of June 30, the Berlin-based shopping club Brands4friends is quitting operations. According to a report in Internet World, employees were informed about this in a letter from a lawyer. The Brands4Friends shopping club was established in 2007 as a startup by Constantin Bisanz, Christian Heitmeyer, Nicolas Speeck and Mario Zimmermann and sold to eBay just three years later for €150 million. At that time, the retailer had a turnover of €80 million, which even grew to €137 million in 2018. In 2019, it was acquired by private equity firm Regent. In FY2021, the company posted positive figures for the first time (profit after tax: €1.21 million), but sales continued to fall, down to €63 million. According to the company, this was planned in order to break even. However, despite a general online boom due to Covid-19 and, according to the company, eight million registered users, the platform was unable to improve further. More than 100 employees will be affected by the closure of the business.

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