Let’s Talk Marketplace: The end of de minimis - just "propaganda"?
I recently sat down with Ingrid Lomer on the Let’s Talk Marketplace podcast to discuss the massive shift coming to European e-commerce: the removal of the €150 "de minimis" customs threshold [01:40].
While many in the industry are celebrating this as a "win" against the flood of cheap parcels from China, I shared a more contrarian view. Here are the three key takeaways from our conversation:
The "Propaganda" of Regulation: The removal of the €150 limit won't stop players like Temu or Shein. These companies are already optimized for local delivery and can easily absorb a 13% customs fee [11:03]. The real challenge isn't taxes; it's the sheer volume of 12 million parcels a day that our manual processes simply aren't built to handle [01:22].
The Sourcing Revolution: I shared my insights from Alibaba.com’s "Co-create Europe" event, where I saw how Agentic AI is moving from "LinkedIn hype" to practical business value [33:11]. From AI-enhanced search to tools that help D2C brands design and source products in minutes, the speed of innovation in China is creating a "tsunami" of new competition [41:55].
Competing Through Innovation, Not Protection: For too long, we’ve relied on digital stagnation in the West [26:26]. If European brands want to survive, they can't just hide behind branding; they need to offer better services and more inventive products. As I like to say, a "practical visionary" doesn't just look for trends—they find ways to build for tomorrow today.
Watch the full interview below:
