Catch of the Decade

CHAPTER 4Recession? Shmecession!

In 2009, the clouds of recession were brewing on the horizon. The US stock market had crashed and as they used to say, ‘When the US coughs, the rest of the world catches a cold’. It's well known that when a recession hits, consumers close their wallets, especially on retail and luxury items. For us at Catchoftheday, nothing could have been further from the truth.

By now we were well established as a clearance house and this recession created incredible opportunities for businesses like ours. Suppliers stuck with stock came knocking like never before.

Cancelled orders, slow‐moving items, customers not buying—the supplier's pain was our gain. The recession was a perfect storm that Catchoftheday needed.

While a recession can hurt many people, we were fortunate in that we were able to play Robin Hood in some ways by giving consumers access to deals the big retailers just couldn't offer. These deals genuinely helped households hit hard by the recession to save money and reduce the impact the recession had on so many.

As we write these words, the world is in the midst of the COVID‐19 pandemic, and we're fighting each other for the last roll of toilet paper at the supermarkets. The future right now is worryingly unclear, but what is clear is that many businesses will not survive this storm because only the strongest businesses can thrive during tough times. Catchoftheday is one of them. We have truly built a recession‐proof, COVID‐19‐proof, bullet‐proof ...