The marketplace Le Cargo in judicial liquidation
Launched in 2017, the marketplace Le Cargo has finally ceased operations. The company, founded by the famous sailor and explorer Gérard d'Aboville, associated with Fanny Adam from Brest, offered a marketplace on the internet exclusively specialized in the field of boating, allowing its customers to sell yachting equipment, but also the auctioning of boats. It was finally placed in judicial liquidation, after less than 2 months of recovery. The liquidator, Maître Dolley, issued an auction order. The website is now officially under maintenance.
What place for online sales in the yachting industry?
As for the rest of society, boaters have increased their purchases on the Internet. The big centers, such as Accastillage Diffusion, UShip or BigShip have not been mistaken, knowing how to develop their sales offers with delivery or in Click&Collect. Specialized websites have emerged, carrying out their own online sales, such as Rue de la Mer or Orange Marine, sometimes going through difficulties, as shown by the recent takeovers. But no marketplace allowing yachting professionals to put their products directly online had had so much visibility before Le Cargo in 2017. However, it has not succeeded in becoming the Amazon of boating. We contacted Gérard d'Aboville and Fanny Adam to share with the rest of the industry the reasons for these difficulties and to allow the industry to learn from them, but they did not wish to express themselves.
The reasons for the end of the Cargo adventure would have been all the more interesting for the equipment manufacturers and companies of the nautical industry as it comes at the same time as the announcement by NauticExpo of the implementation of its payment solutions. The parent company Virtual Expo, which runs several online "virtual trade shows", has taken the step to become a real marketplace by partnering with Mangopay. The future will tell if these specialized marketplaces will be able to cohabit with generalist platforms, but it is certain that online sales for boaters will continue to evolve.
