Best Buy is planning to launch a new third-party marketplace in the US in mid-2025, allowing brands to directly sell their products to Best Buy's customers (similar to how Amazon, Walmart, and other marketplaces allow third-party sellers).
If you've been in the industry long enough and this news sounds familiar, it's because Best Buy previously attempted to run a third-party marketplace in the US from 2011 to 2016. The company eventually shut it down because it only brought in 1% of its revenue and created confusion among buyers who thought they could return products sold by third-party sellers to Best Buy stores. (Customers should have been allowed to return items to Best Buy stores. What a great differentiator that would've been for both buyers and sellers! Such a waste of a national retail footprint…)
Now Best Buy has apparently learned from its mistakes and is ready to re-enter the marketplace business in the US, this time in partnership with Mirakl, a software company that also powers third-party marketplaces for companies like Macy’s, Nordstrom, and Kroger.
It's important to note that Best Buy Canada has already been running a third-party marketplace with Mirakl in the country since 2016, so Best Buy US can pull from that almost decade of experience and data.
Best Buy CEO Corie Barry told investors on an earnings call not to expect a huge marketplace that has everything. Instead, this will be a “curated, tailored marketplace to the customer that is coming to shop with us and those deeper assortments that you would hope you could provide.”
Best Buy says it has more than 200M online customers and generates more than 10B site views and 52M transactions per year. I hope it works this time! Brands can apply to sell on the marketplace here.