What’s up on Whatnot: A letter from our CEO
For most of my life, shopping was a social experience. I grew up going to local card shops with friends, buying packs of Pokemon, and geeking out over what we’d find – together. And like many of you, the shopping mall was the focal point of social life in high school. While community and commerce have always been linked, the traditional places of community-driven shopping have faded away as more and more people have moved online.
A little over four years ago, we set out to build a platform that we, as collectors, wanted to use ourselves. A place to bring the magic of in-person shopping online, for communities to connect over the things they love, and where collectors can turn their passion into a successful business. A place for people like us.
We’re just at the beginning of the next chapter for online shopping, and the next chapter for Whatnot too. As we look ahead, I’d like to take a moment to reflect and thank you for the incredible journey over the past year, and give you an update on our key priorities: helping you grow your business and succeed, continuing to expand to new categories and communities to bring more people to Whatnot, and building products and crafting policies to ensure a trustworthy buying experience for everyone.
Helping Sellers Succeed
You, the sellers, are the heart and soul of Whatnot. Today, tens of thousands of sellers go live every day creating welcoming spaces for people to connect, curate their favorite products, and passionately entertain buyers.
“More seller features were launched in 2023 than all our prior years combined, and the number of sellers making over $100,000 a year has increased by over 75% since 2022 – changing many people’s lives in the process. ”
More ways to grow
We are constantly working to find new ways to help you grow. Getting more viewers in your show is key to gaining more buyers, and with the introduction of Raids in 2023, over 11 million buyers were raided into your streams over the past year.
We also launched Multicasting so you can expand your reach and engagement by broadcasting to multiple platforms simultaneously. You can promote your shows to drive a steady stream of impressions and hold Buyer Appreciation giveaways to show gratitude, build loyalty, and increase connection with your audience.
We’ve rolled out a multitude of other new features to drive sales both within live streams and in the marketplace, like Coupons, Buy Now Pay Later, Simultaneous Auctions and Giveaways, Free or Reduced Shipping, Gifting, and more. Since we launched Tipping last year, buyers have sent nearly one million tips to celebrate and express gratitude for their favorite sellers.
This year, we’re doubling down on advertising and will invest heavily in ads across social media. We’re also giving sellers more options to refer and reward buyers, including a revamped affiliate program that will encourage influencers and publishers to drive buyers to Whatnot.
Making selling easier
Last year we rolled out tools to make it easier to sell on Whatnot. Anytime Auctions brought your curated collections into an exciting 24/7 always-on format. Not only can buyers bid on these auctions outside of a livestream, but they can also bid inside of a livestream when you pin them to your shows.
A big pain point for sellers was negotiating offers with buyers. So we introduced the Offers in Live feature so buyers can make offers on the Buy-It-Now items in your live shop – streamlining the process and avoiding the back-and-forth of negotiating in chat.
Much of the excitement of Whatnot is how quickly auctions run and how many of them there are. It’s fun to watch even when you're not bidding on something. But beneath that fun, there's work sellers need to do to prepare for a show and to manage shipping and returns.
This year, we're investing heavily into making it easier to run your business on Whatnot. We’re rolling out API support to bring your inventory into Whatnot from other places you sell and update those stores when something sells on Whatnot – completely seamlessly. Soon, a new store setup will make it easy to find and sort by pre-bids and bookmarks, and we'll continue to add tooling to reduce payment failures across the platform.
Improving discovery
Buyers come to Whatnot to enjoy incredible shows and buy unique products from expert sellers, and there's a lot we’re working on to make it easier to discover what they might like based on their interests. Soon, we’ll update our categories, feed ranking, and app layout based on how buyers are looking for shows and products, which will help drive sales for sellers.
We’re also making it easier for buyers to find products they may like that cross category boundaries, like Star Wars, LEGO, Vintage Sneakers and more. And our upcoming New Ad formats like search keywords and listings will help you stand out. Stay tuned in on the Whatnot blog for updates on these features and more.
Bringing more categories and people to Whatnot
Whatnot started with just one item: Funko Pop!
Today, you can find thousands of different types of products on Whatnot. From the quirky to the collectible, there’s something for everyone. Over the past year, we’ve more than doubled the number of categories we serve, introducing Electronics, Beauty, Plants (yes, real, living plants), and more. And we’re excited to continue adding more categories to bring new people to Whatnot and help the community discover new interests.
Growing locally, globally
Our first two markets outside of the U.S. were Canada and the U.K., and last year we expanded into France and Germany, starting with Pokemon. We’ve also introduced new categories to our UK and European counterparts like Fashion, Sports, Comics, and Handbags. Trading Card Games and Pokemon is our fastest growing category in Europe, and today, a Pokemon card is sold every second on Whatnot.
Recreating the magic of events
We’ve always shown up alongside our communities at marquee cons like The National Sports Collectors Convention and Comic Con, and 2023 was no different. But we also set out to recreate the magic of events like these on our platform — inviting anyone, from anywhere, to participate and access amazing products and experiences that have historically only been offered at conventions.
We hosted two Whatnot Card Shows last year, with thousands of sellers across the US, Canada, UK, and France running breaks and selling more than half a million singles and memorabilia. Our last Whatnot Card Show saw nearly 120,000 attendees, making it the largest card show in the world.
In 2024 we’re excited to build on Whatnot Card Show and bring this experience to more categories this year. We’ll share more with you soon.
Ensuring a trustworthy experience for the Whatnot Community
One of the reasons we started Whatnot is that we were passionate about collecting but didn’t trust the traditional, impersonal marketplaces where we transacted. Those roots continue to anchor how we operate today, and we’re always evolving our product and policies to protect buyers and sellers.
Promoting a safer shopping experience
We introduced new policies last year to protect our community and maintain a trusted space for you to grow your business, including restricting mystery boxes for sneakers, gating breaks and prohibiting purchase-based prizes.
We also made it so only qualified people have access to sell in complex categories like Luxury Bags & Accessories and Sports Card Breaks. It takes category-specific knowledge and fluency to run Card Breaks in a way that’s enjoyable for both sellers and buyers. By only allowing qualified sellers to run breaks, we can help make sure that both sellers and buyers have consistent and positive experiences on Whatnot.
Empowering you to better manage your buyers’ experience
Whatnot’s strongest sellers know that building trust with buyers with high-quality products and services, and fast and accurate fulfillment, is critical to the growth of your business. Last year, we launched a Trust & Safety dashboard in the Seller Hub so you can see your order fulfillment stats in real time to make sure shipment times, fulfillment rates, and cancellation rates aren’t negatively affecting your buyers’ experiences.
2024 and Whatnot 🚀
It’s time to take everything we’ve learned these past four years and build the next chapter to turn your hobby into a passion, turn your passion into a business, and make a living from what you love. I’m proud of what this community has built so far, and I’m excited about what comes next as we move beyond traditional online shopping to shopping better, together on Whatnot.
– Grant LaFontaine, Whatnot Co-Founder and CEO
