The social commerce space is over crowed, period, and in Canada there are well over 150 different companies trying to capture consumers dollars. As the data points out, only a handful are really making a dent to gain market share. The current leader of the pack Groupon continues to search for new ways to stay ahead of its competitors, and its Andrew Mason, CEO of Groupon struggles each day to keep his job. Of course there is that old saying “if you can’t beat them, join them,” might be the strategy for 2013 that we start to see. This week TeamBuy.ca and Dealfind.com announced the two companies will merge, and together will have 3.5 million members in Canada and the United States.
“From a consolidation perspective, this merger gives us a rock solid foundation where one in every 10 Canadians is signed up to our service,” says Ghassan Halazon, CEO of TeamBuy. “Over the past few years, both TeamBuy and Dealfind have chosen to re-imagine the original daily deal model in very similar ways. This makes the merger a perfect fit from an operational standpoint.”
The two brands will continue operating separately throughout early 2013, after which the sites will be integrated under a single banner and a newly minted website will be unveiled. Ghassan continues in his role as CEO, while TeamBuy President Edward Yao and Dealfind CFO and COO Jason Redman continue in their respective roles.
The merger also includes MenuPalace.com, which prior to the deal had operated alongside Dealfind.com as a North American hub for finding the best restaurants and ordering online.
The combined company plans to increase both the amount of deals and verticals available on the site significantly during 2013, further cementing its status as the go-to site for everyday deals across all major shopping categories. Moving forward, the company also plans to bolster areas including customer service, to further improve response times, and logistics, to significantly reduce shipping times. Halazon also says that deal personalization and mobile experience are both areas in which the company plans to stand out to ensure better relevance and overall user experience.
Prior to the merger, the two companies enjoyed robust sales, achieving a combined $7M in gross sales in their last full month apart. Various investors including Insight Venture Partners, ru-Net, Georgian Partners and Ontario Venture Capital Fund, back the merged company.
