• Launched in an "eco-responsible" approach, the application of object donations between Geev individuals also responds to the increasingly present problems of purchasing power.

  • The Covid crisis "was a gigantic accelerator", assures the co-founder of the application which will process between eight and ten million donations this year, against one million in 2020.

  • The business model is based on professional, paid accounts, advertising for the free version of the app and a "premium" subscription plan at 25 euros per year.

Born in Bordeaux five years ago, the start-up Geev today employs around fifteen people.

Its co-founder Hakim Barka returns for

20 Minutes

to the developments in the application specializing in the donation of objects, and to the boom in toys as Christmas approaches.


You have observed for two years, an increase in toys and objects recovered on the Geev application, during the holiday season, why?

Between 2020 and 2021, we recorded + 20% on toy donations around the Christmas period, knowing that the toy represents around 600,000 objects per year on our platform.

We expect at least as much this year, especially as people increasingly manage their stocks in advance: they basically empty their cupboards at the beginning of December in order to be able to fill them three weeks later.

There may also be a joint awareness.

We are really seeing it this year, the question of purchasing power is increasingly present.

On Geev, everything is free?

That's it.

The application, released in the spring of 2017, was born from the observation that there was at that time a gigantic gap between the sale of second-hand items on the one hand, and bulky items on the other.

For us, it was heresy that there was no platform, reaching thousands of people, on this theme of donation.

When we started working on this project, hardly anyone understood where we wanted to go, and the attitudes, the comments, between the launch of the application five years ago and today, it's the day and the night.

In a very short time, the world has changed.

The Covid has been a gigantic accelerator: we are going to make between eight and ten million donations this year, when we only made one million two years ago...

What objects do we find on Geev, and who is your audience?

We find all the usual products, such as furniture, household appliances, as well as a share of food... Geev is not a dump, we do not recover all the rotten objects that are not sold on other platforms.

It is really the user who chooses an objective other than that of remuneration.

It should be borne in mind that platforms for the sale of second-hand objects meet, at best, 40% success, which means that more than half of the objects posted on Le Bon Coin or Vinted are never sold. , which represents millions of objects.

In addition, a sales process is complicated and can take time.

Geev is above all positioned on the eco-responsible theme, but we have several profiles who visit our site, and some people are also in need,

What are the requirements that you set to guarantee the quality of the object?

The only criterion we have is use: from the moment the object can be used, it passes.

A very dirty, damaged sofa, even if it is only three years old, it does not pass.

If it is thirty years old but is in good condition, it is OK.

This is where we come in addition to associations, because some associations, which look at the resale potential of objects, would not accept some of those who come to us.

Can companies make donations on your platform?

This year, we opened the platform to professionals, with stores that give unsold items or customer returns, directly from the point of sale.

It is a way for these brands to enhance their stocks and attract traffic to their stores.

We will continue to develop this.

More broadly, what is your business model?

We are working more and more in BtoB with professionals.

There are stores that have paid accounts, mass distribution chains for furniture, textiles, etc. For individuals, there is a free version of the application financed by advertising, and a paid version at 25 euros per an, in which subscribers receive benefits, such as the possibility of priority access to certain objects and recovery in greater volume, while non-subscribers are restricted.

Subscribers can thus have almost unlimited access to a catalog of products ranging from furniture to food.

We have about 20,000 subscribers so far, it's starting to work well.



What will your turnover be for 2022?

We are not yet profitable, but we should still arrive this year between 800,000 euros and one million euros in turnover, and four million subscribers by Christmas.

We radiate throughout France, and we are even beginning to take an interest in foreign countries.

Planet

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  • Economy

  • circular economy

  • Christmas

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