Marketplace expansion is often cause for celebration, but can quickly turn into chaos. Without the right systems, growing merchants face delayed listings, out-of-sync inventories, and frustrated customers. These challenges force many brands to sacrifice agility for scalability, adding costly tools and personnel to meet increased demand.
Three brands—Boardriders, Jimmy Key, and SmartBuyGlasses—faced these problems at different points in their growth. Instead of cutting into revenue and cluttering processes with additional people or tools, they cured their growing pains by streamlining operations. Here’s how.
Boardriders: 35% growth from 50 new channels
Boardriders, the global action sports and lifestyle company behind brands like Quiksilver and Billabong, faced a major challenge: coordinating 12 marketplaces and 15 countries while still looking to grow into more channels. Managing listings, updates, and performance at this scale became increasingly complex and inefficient. To take control, Boardriders turned to Rithum.
By centralizing its marketplace operations onto a single platform, the company simplfied workflows and gained visibility across all channels. This allowed them to
increase their active channel count from 140 to 190 in just one year, without adding more staff or tools. The result? A 35% increase in ecommerce growth with the ability to expand further across Europe and the U.S.
Jimmy Key: Exceeded revenue goals by 300% in under one year
Turkish fashion brand Jimmy Key had ambitious goals for European expansion, but siloed inventory systems and delayed listings were holding them back. Launching on new marketplaces meant long lead times and coordination headaches.
Partnering with Rithum cleared the roadblocks in Jimmy Key’s way. With Rithum powering their listings through Zalando’s ZEOS platform, Jimmy Key rapidly scaled operations and launched on four major marketplaces. Within 11 months, they were live in seven countries across Europe and exceeded their revenue targets by 300%.
SmartBuyGlasses: 90%+ faster listing time with 10x catalog expansion
SmartBuyGlasses, a Hong Kong-based eyewear retailer, looked to scale its catalog and marketplace reach, but exhaustive API builds stood in the way. Every update required extensive manual support; listing new products for cross-border ecommerce was too time-consuming for expansion to be feasible.
By switching to Rithum’s self-service platform, SmartBuyGlasses eliminated the need for manual builds and increased team productivity by 150x, dramatically accelerating time to market and supercharging growth. The team expanded their catalog from 1,500 to 15,000 SKUs and cut listing time by over 90%, giving them the agility to move faster, sell more, and enter new marketplaces without upending their operations.
All three brands faced the same underlying problem: operational inefficiency that limited marketplace growth. But with Rithum, Boardriders, Jimmy Key, and SmartBuyGlasses unlocked a new level of scalability without overwhelming their teams or sacrificing their bottom lines.
Whatever your growth goals, expanding efficiently starts with a strong multichannel strategy. Schedule a demo to see how Rithum can support your next move.
David Monterroso is Director, Sales Engineering, at Rithum.
