Back Market will hire 200 people in Barcelona in the next three years

Spain has become the fifth market by business volume for the French marketplace Back Market, specialized in the sale of reconditioned electronic products. For this reason, the company has decided to move the management of the Spanish market, where it entered five years ago, from Paris to Barcelona, and has set up in the Wojo office building, on Calle Sancho de Ávila, in the 22@ district.

For its development, Back Market will hire about 50 people throughout this year and expects to reach 200 employees within three years, according to Nathanael Berbessou, general manager of the company in Spain. The group, created in 2004 by Thibaud Hug de Larauze, Quentin Le Brouster and Vianney Vaute, has a global workforce of 600 people and a presence in 16 countries, most of them European.

Barcelona will be a headquarters for decision-making regarding the group's clients and industrial partners in the Spanish market, which will add to the work carried out in the offices that the online platform has in Paris, Bordeaux, Berlin and New York.

Recently, Back Market has launched into the Japanese market and plans to do so in South Korea to reach Asian countries, as a result of its international expansion plan, which it has intensified after closing a financing round of 450 million euros, led by Sprints Capital. The new investor has joined a shareholding made up of Eurazeo, Aglaé Ventures, General Atlantic and Generation Investment Management.

The general manager for Spain explains that having an operations center in Barcelona will allow "to get closer to customers, but also to collaborate more closely with the reconditioning industries of electronic devices that work with the online sales and services platform." "We have 1,500 industries in our marketplace, of which 10% are Spanish," specifies Berbessou.

"Consumers are increasingly aware that, although price remains their priority, they want to contribute to sustainability and the environment and see how buying a reconditioned product is a good way to achieve it," assures the company's manager.

This is also the profile of the Spanish customer, "a young person under 35 who takes care of their savings, but also of the planet". However, due to the country's idiosyncrasy, "the number of older users of the platform is also significant, which I believe ---he states--- is due to the fact that in Spain young people take longer to become independent and often it is their parents who still cover their electronics expenses."

With more than six million customers worldwide, the Back Market platform plans to include new services shortly. For the end user, it has already incorporated the direct sale of devices and their repair. It also wishes to expand its range of product references.

One of the company's main objectives will be to further limit failure rates across all devices so that consumers have a sustainable alternative to buying new technology. Quality is also guaranteed by a 2-year contractual warranty for all purchases.