Now very much on our radar: a Berlin outfit Pepper.com, which is billed as the largest deal community in the world.
Actually a growing collection of localised deal sites and communities supported by advertising, including HotUKDeals (UK), MyDealz (Germany), Pepper NL and Dealabs (France), Pepper.com currently enables roughly 25 million consumers to publish, discuss and vote on promotions - resulting in about 500 million page impressions on a monthly basis.
Largely under the radar, the Berlin-based e-commerce group is in the midst of executing a global expansion strategy. It already employs 100 people around the world, with HQ in Berlin and European offices in London and Lyon.
In September, Pepper.com merged with Desidime to establish a presence in India. Today, Pepper.com is announcing a joint-venture with Méliuz, Brazil’s largest cashback community, its second foray into Latin America after establishing a discount site called Promodescuentos in Mexico.
Méliuz and Pepper.com will together launch Pelando.com.br, describing it as Brazil’s first social commerce network.
But the bigger story here is Pepper.com's founders' ambition to build the world’s largest social commerce group. Started by Fabian Spielberger and Paul Nikkel, the company is currently active in 11 countries on three continents, and the team aims to expand this presence globally through partnerships, mergers and acquisitions in the coming years.
The company claims it's profitable - in fact, its core assets, HotUKDeals and Mydealz, were started in 2003 and 2007, respectively, and have been bootstrapped/financed through its profits since then.
Remarkably, Pepper.com has not taken a cent of outside funding to date.
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