Catch of the Decade

GOODBYE, FAREWELL AND GOOD LUCK

When we sat down to write our final email to say goodbye, farewell and good luck to those who had been a part of our journey for so long, we struggled to put into words what we were feeling. How do you say goodbye to a team, a business, a lifestyle that had defined who and what you are for more than a decade? What do you say to those who have helped you achieve your wildest dreams and given you back so much more than you could ever give them? It went something like this and it's a fitting end to our book.

It was early 2006, back in the early days of online shopping. eBay Australia had launched a year earlier, and few, if any, of the big retail players had launched their own website, let alone started selling online.

We decided to jump in, headfirst, and they laughed at us. ‘Selling one product every single day? You must be crazy!’ they said. ‘Why would anyone come to a site that has only one product a day? That's not a business!’

We must have been mad to think that something like this would work, but by 2008 we had managed to sell 4000 Toshiba laptops in a single day and $1 million worth of Samsung TVs in an hour, just to name a couple of deals.

By 2010 Catch of the Day was Australia's No.1, the most visited shopping site. This achievement put us on the map and stirred up the retail landscape like never before.

The next few years have been busy to say the least. In no particular order, we launched, built or acquired:

• Scoopon
• Grocery Run
• Mumgo ...