Jeff Bezos and Dominic Allonby aren’t often included in the same sentence. Bezos has spent the last three decades building an e-commerce empire. His Amazon, in addition to a generational cloud infrastructure business in AWS, runs a marketplace that has transformed households around the world. Amassing 300 million active customers across 17 global marketplaces, Amazon owns the pole position in the share of mind and wallet among global consumers.

Allonby’s resume is far more understated, yet impressive nonetheless. As CEO of Fruugo, he manages just 62 employees, a tiny fraction of the over 1.3 million ‘Amazonians.’ Still, Allonby and his business serve as a representation of the fragmentation in Europe that keeps Bezos and Amazon’s leadership up at night.

Why? Platforms like Fruugo offer advantages for both entrepreneurs selling online and purchasing customers. Thanks to localization, Amazon’s competitors are pushed to deliver unique, high-quality experiences to customers in order to drive traffic and maximize profits. Shoppers benefit from lower prices, better quality products and an improved experience. And as a result, these marketplaces threaten Amazon’s ownership of the digital shelf.

Leveling The Playing Field

In Europe, creators in consumer packaged goods (CPG) have options. There is ample opportunity for business owners and entrepreneurs who want to list their goods online to sell through many different marketplaces, each with its own flavor. Unlike the United States, where Amazon owns over 50% share of e-commerce traffic, Europe has a more level playing field. Third-party sellers benefit from listing their products across marketplaces such as Zalando, Allegro, Wish, Flubit, OnBuy, OTTO and, of course, Fruugo.

Read it all at: Local & Vertical: Defining The Next Decade Of E-Commerce