EDC Retail from Veendam is the company behind EasyToys.nl and market leader in sex toys in the Benelux. Thirteen years ago, Eric Idema started EDC, which has managed to double their sales for six years in a row and to crown itself a CrossBorder Top 30 company three times. In Germany, EDC is now on an important mission: to regain the trust of German consumers after taking over the bankrupt Beate Uhse Group. Beate Uhse is still Germany's largest erotic shop by name, but there is still much work to be done. What is the strategy of this accomplished crossborder player to take the German market from scratch recapture the German market?
EDC's crossborder flight began in Belgium, followed by Germany and France. They are now also active on all marketplaces worldwide. Marketplaces are therefore an essential part of the crossborder strategy, explains e-commerce director Joël Groen: "Via marketplaces you can discover trends and discover a market in a very good way. What works? How does the consumer react? Which market suits us and where is potential? That is good to investigate before you set up fully localized shops and set up teams for that."
Acquisition of Beate Uhse Group
Beate Uhse, founded by the feminist of the same name, has traditionally been the biggest name in the erotica industry in Germany. This powerwoman and pioneer managed to turn her erotic company into a listed empire with a lot of name recognition in Germany. Unfortunately, since 2017, several branches of the group went bankrupt. EDC did not hesitate for a moment and bought up some of these branches to rebuild the crumbling empire in Germany.
Trust
Regaining the trust of German consumers. That is the goal. A complex process, in which several major market surveys have now been launched among our eastern neighbors. The heritage of Beate-Uhse.com is partly positive, but unfortunately also partly negative. Where many consumers have been duped, much damage has been done. To EDC now the important task to regain the trust of German consumers. Through various platforms, hard work is now being done on the rebranding.
"Beate Uhse has been known in Germany for 60 years as a traditional mail-order company. Since 2006, the webshop Beate-uhse.com went live. However, the company did not succeed in winning out from the catalog background online against stiff competition. Not much remains of the great brand recognition of yesteryear. EDC will have to reload the brand especially online. As a crossborder e-commerce pioneer, EDC has good cards to play here. It is smart that they want to bet on the growth of marketplaces. Hopefully with their approach they can also secure a spot in next year's CrossBorder Top 30."
Andreas Giese - CEO Dexport
The approach
So how does EDC do that? First, it is important to take a closer look at the competition. The biggest competitors are Amorelie.de and Eis.de.From this competition, EDC wants to differentiate itself. EDC wants to appeal to a different type of consumer. The competitors as well as Beate-Uhse.com are "stuck in the middle" while EDC wants to focus on sexual wellness. "We sell pleasure, happiness and health and can also offer this through social media, podcasts with our sex therapists in an approachable way making it much more mainstream EasyToys just like what we do with EasyToys."
Loyal German
German consumers are very nationalistic, Joel has noticed. "The German is incredibly loyal and prefers to buy from a German party. We currently still ship from the Netherlands, so that could still change. We have hired a customer happiness manager, who is researching this further. Who are our customers in Germany and what do they want from us?" A lot of marketing budget is put into Google Ads and other performance channels to regain that share. As Joel describes it, "consumers come to us now, but lack the confidence to buy. We are therefore working on certification by the largest online trustmark Trusted Shops. For Germany, that is an absolute added value."
States
The fact that Germany is a complex market is something Joel now notices in the market surveys. "It's a gigantic market with immense regional differences. It can be compared to the US. You don't roll out to America, you go to 50 states. Even in Germany you notice the cultural differences within the states." With 14 years of cross border e-commerce experience, Joel knows it's not that simple. The strategy to conquer the German market is contradictory. On the one hand, Joël acknowledges that Germany, because of the different federal states takes a lot of time, but on the other hand, he admits that the strategy is as follows: go big. That means setting up TV campaigns and working with big influencers,x-playmates, famous Germans, you name it. "We bought the biggest name, which we now want to make big again in terms of sales," he says.
Challenge
That influencer marketing strategy requires extra attention. In fact, advertising on social media is complex in this industry. Erotic content is blocked a lot by Instagram and Facebook. "Organically, we can push it reasonably well, but as soon as we want to 'arrange something paid,' we are quickly banned. Lingerie we can still get through, but anything that contains the word 'sextoy' or 'sex' doesn't." And so EDC has to get creative. In September, a campaign will go live that carefully circumvents Instagram's prudish rules. "This campaign will make you think about what we want to sell you, without you seeing or reading it in concrete terms," he says. Thus, EDC distances itself from the "flat" and focuses on sexual wellness, where discretion is key.
Growing up with EDC
EDC is not just focusing on the audience they want to reach now. The younger target group also gets attention. By posting videos on the popular medium TikTok about how to use a condom, where EasyToys is carefully branded or by handing out free condoms, they are now planting the seed. Being where young people develop their (sexual) identity. On a journey of discovery together, and when the time comes, they will hopefully know how to find EDC again. "Because building trust starts from an early age," says Dr. K. K., "and that's where we're going to be."
