Nice to see you all. The future of e-commerce. Who will win it? Marcin Kuśmierz from Allegro. Rafał Brzoska from InPost will spare himself so as not to steal precious time.
Why? Why are you sitting in the middle?
Further introduction for safety. This is the so-called buffer zone. I am that buffer zone. I have known you for many years, also privately. It is an honor to lead this conversation. Rules, quick rounds, the same questions so that there are no suspicions that the questions are rigged.
Let's hope there's no counting.
Yes, so who will start? Marcin, heads or tails? Heads or tails?
It's rolling.
Heads starts. You can choose whether you answer first or Rafał answers first.
Then maybe I'll go first.
First. Um, e-commerce as we know it, um, and like it, meaning fast deliveries, large platforms with a wide offer, that's the past, that's the end. True or false?
Absolutely false. This is just the beginning, because if we look at the penetration of e-commerce in relation to total retail, we are talking about a dozen or so percent. So it's great that we are accelerating. Certainly e-commerce is not something new, because it has been with us for decades, but looking at such surges in various parts of the world, this penetration is sometimes two, two and a half times higher, so still long, long, I think decades of steady, rapid growth.
Rafał, true or false that the e-commerce we know has already hit the ceiling?
Of course it hasn't hit the ceiling, and it's great that the first question is immediately in agreement. However, indeed the e-commerce we know is ending. It is ending primarily because it is a chapter, it is not the finish line, it is the beginning of something new. And that new thing is starting now and will redefine absolutely everything. I can compare it to the famous saying of Henry Ford who said that his Ford T is for millions, for the masses. Everyone can choose any car color, as long as it is black. And in e-commerce it is similar. There are platforms that say: 'We will give you everything you expect, any form of delivery.' As long as in the end it is an Allegro One Box. That era is ending.
Let's talk for a moment about trends in e-commerce. We have quick commerce, live shopping, we have AI in search, recommendations, probably some others. Which of these trends in your opinion are a real paradigm shift in how this industry works, and which are just hype? Rafał first this time.
I think, you know, we would have to look at each of these elements. Quick commerce is, I would say, impulsive, so it will always be a niche. Um, live shopping, um, I personally believe it will also redefine the Polish market. We have 14 million TikTok users. TikTok has been saying for many months that it will enter Poland with its shopping. Knowing the character of the target group, it may turn out to be a success, so it can undoubtedly influence how e-commerce looks. It will probably accelerate. However, what will really change the face of e-commerce and I have been saying this for two years on this stage, is of course the development of artificial intelligence. That is, these AI engines will redefine the entire purchasing paradigm. The customer will cease to be an element of the checkout, the customer will be the main decider of absolutely everything, and either someone adapts to this or simply loses. Moreover, looking at the results recently published by Google AI Overview, it is very simple. 48% of product searches we ask Google are already taken over by this Google AI engine. And if we add the word 'best', it is 83%. This means that the classic search model based on, for example, comparison engines like Ceneo, which is part of the Allegro group, is simply dying. And it is dying because the customer wants to have a choice. If the customer's choice is modified by an algorithm, it ceases to be a choice.
Well, but InPost doesn't believe in quick commerce. Maybe you just can't do it,
but why should we be in some niche or where must we, why do we have to be everywhere? We are not betting on those growth engines that from our point of view are the most promising. We stick to our core business, we believe that such a strategy is simply right.
Marcin, quick commerce, live shopping, AI in search, recommendations. Which of these trends are the most important?
You know, probably all of them. Is there one leading? No. Rafał talks about live shopping, about TikTok. I think the number of attempts to enter e-commerce through that platform is infinite, and they were usually outside Asia, which is a different latitude, different culture, different adaptation of new technologies. In Europe, in most cases, they ended in failure. As for AI, I agree with Rafał that here and now it is a revolution, it is a different way of buying, a different way of experiencing the shopping process. But I also look at it prospectively, that in two or three years AI will be practically invisible in the commercial process. Technology will have such high saturation that it doesn't matter whether we talk about a marketplace, shopping assistants, or hybrid stores, AI will be everywhere and this technology will become very democratized. It is important that platforms are at the forefront of changes, that they build even short-term competitive advantage, that they follow the customer, that they are able to identify their needs, not only purchasing, but generally needs that they want to fulfill online, and that, however generally it sounds, they outpace the past. So AI today is of course a buzzword we use in every context. We ourselves have implemented several assistants, several types for different stakeholder groups, targeted customers, and they adapt fantastically, but we also know how fast technological progress is and how fast the adaptation of new technology is, and I put forward the thesis that in two or three years this assistant will be in every single shopping place. What will happen next, we'll see. We have fantastic technology development and we have a fantastic race between individual platforms.
