These are the 49 most relevant European SPORT marketplaces in 2024
Last update: 8. November 2024
After a challenging 2023, things are looking better again for the sports industry – at least: for parts of it. Overall, market researchers e.g. from McKinsey have predicted a growth of +4% for the European sports industry in 2024, with a stable online percentage of round about 18 per cent. But the good news are not equally distributed: While sports apparel and shoes are still struggling – just as the whole fashion industry does – business for sports equipment is picking up.
This trend has direct consequences for the marketplace landscape for sports goods as Version 6 of our “Marketplace Quadrant Sports” illustrates. We have seen sports fashion platforms fighting for relevance and market shares, and had to take some marketplaces out of our quadrant because they lost that fight. On the other hand, most of the newcomers which we added in our last installment, are either generalistic marketplaces or new players in sports equipment. Interesting niches like sneaker marketplaces are also continuing to grow.
The most important players
The generalists
Due to its broad nature varying from fashion and shoes to hardware and electronic devices, generalistic marketplaces have always played an important role for this industry. The most important ones are:
- Relevant for all of Europe: Amazon and ebay.
- Local Heroes: Otto, Kaufland and limango in Germany, Galaxus and Manor in Switzerland, Allegro in Poland, bol in the Netherlands, CDiscount and CDON in France, emag in Romania, skroutz in Greece
- Department Stores with included online marketplace: Breuninger, Wehkamp, El Corte Ingles, Debenhams, Galeries Lafayette, La Redoute, ellos, and John Lewis.
The specialists
While the generalists opened the sports industry for marketplaces, a lot of interesting specialist platforms have since then evolved – some of them more than capable to conquer market shares from the generalists:
- Decathlon is the biggest marketplace in Europe solely focussed on sporting goods. The originally French player is growing strongly all over Europe and is hard at work to establish their marketplace in more and more countries – at the moment the marketplace for Decathlon.hu is in the works.
- Sprinter is a huge sports marketplace and stores chain in Spain, Portugal and Netherlands. At the close of 2023, they weathered an insolvency, but they seem to be back on track now.
- Alltricks specializes on mostly bike, running, and training.
- French player Colizey focuses on premium sporting assortments.
- Tradeinn covers many different focussed sports areas with their sub-brands like bikeinn, waveinn, and traininn.
- Obelink is a Dutch marketplaces concentrating solely on Outdoors adventures and camping equipment.
- Private Sports-Shop is a specialised off-price marketplace just for the sports industry.
A question of assortment
Because the sports industry spans across several industry categories, there are a lot of other marketplaces that might be of interest for certain products – even if they don’t have a classic sports focus.
- For more Sports Fashion related products consider:
- Decathlon, Amazon, Zalando, About you, Asos, Debenhams, Breuninger, Wehkamp, Farfetch, Best Secret, El Corte Ingles
- For more Sports Hard Goods & Equipement related products consider:
- Decathlon, Amazon, Galaxus, Stadium, CDON, Otto, Media Markt, Bol, Allegro, Kaufland
Conclusion
The sports marketplace business continues to evolve, marked by the emergence of highly focused marketplaces such as Decathlon, Sprinter, Alltricks, Colizey, and TradeInn, which specialize exclusively in sports. These are complemented by a range of generalists and local heroes, which together cover the vast diversity of sports marketplace categories. Together all these platforms form a vibrant and dynamic “Marketplace Quadrant Sports”.
Have we missed a marketplace? Do you have any input to add to our quadrant? Let us know!
Check out all our other Marketplace Category and Country Quadrants here!