Australian online shopping club OzSale.com.au has acquired market competitor Buyinvite.com.au for an undisclosed sum, as it ramps up its operations both here and overseas.<\/p>\n
<\/span> <\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n OzSale, founded in 2006 by its chairman Jamie Jackson, is a members-only online shopping club, which describes itself as a \u201cdoorway to affordable designer fashion\u201d.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The business, which is part of the APAC Sale Group, has buyers in Australia, New Zealand, Asia and Europe, who negotiate deals directly with suppliers to offer exclusivity to their members.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n With more than 250 staff, OzSale says it sells a product every five seconds via its websites, across five countries. The business has now acquired Buyinvite.com.au for an undisclosed sum.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Founded by Ben Hollenstein in 2008, Buyinvite is an online sales events club, whereby members search for designer brands \u2013 across clothing, shoes and electronics \u2013 at discounted prices.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n According to Jackson, the acquisition of Buyinvite will give both businesses a combined database of more than five million members.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe thought [Buyinvite] had quite incredible growth in the three years they\u2019ve been in the environment,\u201d Jackson told StartupSmart<\/i>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Jackson is quick to point out the Buyinvite team will remain the same, insisting that was a key part of negotiations.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBuyinvite will run as a separate site. It won\u2019t change at all. The branding will stay the same,\u201d Jackson says.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe buying teams won\u2019t change. The management team won\u2019t change, but Ben will come on the board of OzSale.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n According to Hollenstein, who is currently in Los Angeles, Buyinvite was in discussions with OzSale for six months regarding the prospect of working together.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe online space is fast-paced and competition is increasing,\u201d Hollenstein said in a statement.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cNow is the right time to build upon our foundations and leverage OZSale.com.au\u2019s infrastructure and scale across all of its core markets.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe have some exciting plans for the brand, which include expanding into new non-apparel categories.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Jackson says OzSale is equally as focused on the future, with plans to ramp up its operations in Australia and New Zealand, and also overseas.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re pushing for overseas markets \u2013 South East Asia, the Philippines, Korea and the Indonesian markets,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cKorea we\u2019re hoping to have in the next two months, and the same with the Philippines. Malaysia is already open and Thailand is going very well. Indonesia is also in discussions.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe also just signed a deal in China \u2013 we\u2019re going to be supplying and also taking products form a very large site in China.\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Buyinvite is the first acquisition for OzSale, but, according to Jackson, it might not be the last.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re looking at numerous other options out there. It\u2019s about finding a bolt-on that will add value,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Jackson attributes OzSale\u2019s success to his team, insisting \u201cI couldn\u2019t have done this myself\u201d.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe all work extremely hard with incredible focus. The energy I get from a young team is incredible. They\u2019re all creating a new online shopping portal for the Australian market,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s so much more to do. The Australian online environment is still very young [but] my feeling is that Australia and New Zealand will be stronger than the US and UK.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Australian online shopping club OzSale.com.au has acquired market competitor Buyinvite.com.au for an undisclosed sum, as it ramps up its operations<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62154,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36219"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36219"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36219\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62154"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}