CHAPTER 3Gaining momentum
By early 2007 we still had only seven staff, but our revenue and the volume of transactions were growing rapidly. From a rocky start of selling just $1000 worth of goods a day, we were now selling $10 000 a day worth across all three sites: eBay, DailyDeals.com.au and Catchoftheday. These figures were never going to put the big retailers out of business, but we were energetic, motivated and excited to see our figures grow. We had no inkling we were creating a billion‐dollar business! We were just like a bunch of kids having fun playing with computers.
From the get‐go, it was very clear that there were three parties needed to make this business work: Catch‐supplier‐customer. Without customers, we had no business. Without suppliers, we had no deals to attract customers.
From our early days of buying, we realised that all suppliers—no matter how good they are—make mistakes when buying. There is a joke in the retail world: ‘The buyer is always wrong’. They either buy too much, or too little. Being the buyers at Catchoftheday, we understood the meaning behind this joke and lived it every single day—and any buyer reading this book right now is surely nodding their head in agreement.
We are better buyers!
Suppliers get caught out with excess stock for ...
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