20 Things You Didn’t Know About Berlin Brands Group
Berlin Brands Group is a commerce company that specializes in providing vertical products for consumers including electronic products, home and living, sound and light, and more. It’s made the news in business circles lately with an infusion of investor fundraising that has catapulted its valuation to new heights. This is one to keep your eye on as it is gaining a strong presence in the global community. If you’re not yet familiar with the organization, here are 20 things you probably didn’t know about the Berlin Brands Group.
1. Berlin Brands Group is a young startup
According to Crunchbase, Berlin Brands Group has only been active for six years and it is becoming a giant in its niche of the industry. The organization was founded in 2005 with its headquarters located in Berlin, Germany. It is a multi-brand conglomerate that features a variety of different German brands in the consumer commerce sector. It brings together Germany’s top-selling consumer goods under one roof.
2. Berlin Brands Group is a versatile company
BBG encompasses the entire value chain of its participating brands from product conception, design and development, through the production processes, their marketing, and also customer service. The main headquarters in Berlin oversees the phases of brand development including a multi-channel distribution network of products. The company falls under the industry categories of E-Commerce, Retail, and Consumer Electronics.
3. Berlin Brands Group has a 4-member executive leadership team
The executive leadership team at Berlin Brands Group is small, but it is dynamic. Henrik Haenecke is the managing director and chief financial officer. Robert Hein is the CIO of Berlin Brands Group. Peter Chaljawski is the founder and chief executive officer. Stephan Thonniben is the CCO of the company. Together, these talented young professionals have built an enterprise that is taking the business world by storm.
4. Berlin Brands Group uses a small number of technology products and services
We were impressed to learn that Berlin Brands Group gets by with the use of just 14 technology products and services to power its website. Comparable companies of its kind usually employ the use of dozens of actively used tech products and services, but the website functions at a high level providing a smooth and seamless user experience without going over the top on tech products. Some of the tech products used to power the website include PHP, Google Tag Manager, HTML5, and others. The limited number of tech products helps to keep the overhead cost of IT services low.
5. Berlin Brands Group maintains uniqueness in the industry with a cutting edge over rivals
Berlin Brands Group has been successful in securing the registration of 8 patents in the working of plastics category. This gives them an edge over competitors in similar industries because they offer unique products. The intellectual properties protected through patents have become the legal property of Berlin Brands Group. None of its competitors can copy, imitate, or use these secrets unless express permission is granted by Berlin Brands Group.
6. Berlin Brands Group has a low number of monthly visitors to its website
We also learned that over the past 30 days, there has been a decrease in the number of monthly visits to the official website. The analytics for the website shows that just 4,834 people visited the site. This represents a 19.01 percent decrease in web traffic. This number has been impacted by a previous surge in interest from Slovakia that dropped off rapidly. The Group’s website is ranked as number 1,635,477 of the millions of websites registered on the world wide web. They’ve got a little work to do in the marketing division, but the company is still enjoying ample interest and sales.
7. Berlin Brands Group is the most popular in Germany
The analytics for the Berlin Brands Group website shows that it is the most popular with people from the country of Germany, its place of origin. Forty percent of the web traffic is from visitors who live in Germany, with a monthly visits growth rate of an impressive 45.46 percent. This offsets the overarching figure of slowed interest from other countries and it also shows a healthy rate of interest increase from its home base. Twenty percent of the web traffic comes from people in the United States. Fifteen percent are from the Slovak Republic with a 70.9 percent decrease in interest, which accounts for the perceived slump in interest. Thirteen percent of the web traffic is from people in France, with a monthly visits growth rate of 11.52 percent over the past 30 days, and twelve percent of the visitors to the website are from the United Kingdom.
8. Berlin Brands Group is backed by Private Equity investors
Berlin Brands Group has participated in two rounds of private equity fundraising. The most recent round was completed on September 1, 2021. It is considered an early-stage VC/PE-backed company with a total of four investors. The most recent investors are UniCredit Group and Bain Capital.
9. Investor confidence is high in Berlin Brands Group
We also learned that the total amount of private equity funding received over the two fundraising rounds is $940 million. Distributed across four investors, this shows that the firms must have high confidence in Berlin Brands Group to make such large investments in its future profitability. UniCredit Group and Bain Capital and joined by DeutscheBank and Commerzbank with all four investment firms participating as lead investors.
10. Bain Capital is a major stakeholder in the company
According to PE Hub, Bain Capital has weighed in with a strong and bold bet on Berlin Brands Group. It has negotiated with Ardian to acquire its stake in the company. Ardian previously held a minority stake in the company, and it has now agreed to sell that stake to the powerful Bain Capital, making it a major player on the ground floor of the rising new unicorn.
11. Berlin Brands Group is privately held
Berlin Brands Group has maintained its option to remain a privately owned company, allowing shares in the future profitability to be doled out per investment agreements to its backers. Although the precise terms of the investment agreements have not been disclosed, we’ve learned that these are minority shares. The organization remains under the control and majority ownership of its founder. Berlin Brands Group is not a publicly-traded company, so you won’t find shares available on any of the public stock exchanges, at least, not yet.
12. Berlin Brands Group is a unicorn
According to Techcrunch, Berlin Brands Group has remarkably received unicorn status just six years after the company launched. The most recent round of private equity fundraising has resulted in the company achieving a valuation of more than $1 billion. This is the required amount for a company to join the elite status to the exclusive group of companies valued at a minimum of $1 billion or more.
13. Berlin Brands Group buys up smaller companies and builds them up
A part of the strategy of Berlin Brands Group’s growth plans includes purchasing small companies and building up their brands. It’s now buying up these smaller brands that typically sell their goods on marketplaces such as Amazon.com. They run the companies and then scale them to increase efficiency and to promote the brands to grow and become more successful in the consumer marketplace.
14. Berlin Brands Group is expanding its infrastructure
One of the goals that Berlin Brands Group has set for itself is to build its logistics and fulfillment infrastructure. Another goal is to build its tech platform. The latest round of investor funding has provided $700 million for the company to invest in all of thee growth areas as the company continues to become a giant in the industry. BBG remarked that they also plan to use the funding to continue the purchase of more small companies to build up and grow.
15. The founder of Berlin Brands Group was formerly a DJ
We also learned an interesting fact about the founder of Berlin Brands Group. Peter Chaljawski started his professional career in a very different industry. He was first a DJ. This exposed him to the ins and outs of audio equipment. He developed his electronics for personal and professional use. In time, he saw that he could grow and expand his passion and that is when he founded Berlin Brands Group. He’s a whiz at improving the efficiency of tech products and he expanded upon this talent through the launch of a new company that grew into other vertical markets.
16. Berlin Brands Group has expanded its product line
Berlin Brands Group now claims the ownership of 14 of its brands across multiple industries. Auna is its home electronics and music equipment brand. Klarstein is its kitchen appliances brand. Blumfeldt is for gardening supplies, Capital Sports is the home fitness brand, and there are numerous others with a total of 3,700 different products sold.
17. Berlin Brands Group is a global company
Berlin Brands Group has a far-reaching presence that has penetrated many of the world’s markets. It is present in the United States, Asia, the United Kingdom, and various places in Europe. It currently focuses on 100 channels that are distributed throughout 28 countries in the world. BBG has access to 1.5 billion e-commerce customers currently.
18. Berlin Brands Group is disrupting the e-commerce industry
When it comes to the consumer goods space, the environment is rapidly changing. The recent pandemic has resulted in a big surge in online sales, which is good for companies like Berlin Brands Group. The thing about BBG that makes it so unique is that it can acquire new companies that are small and make them run more efficiently to bring them into the fold of the larger parent company. In the end, it’s good for consumers who have more and better products to choose from. BBG has a unique e-commerce platform that is rated as being highly efficient when compared to many others. This is the sole factor that makes it such a disruptor in the industry. BBG has set the bar high and it will be up to the others to try to keep up with them if they want to remain competitive. The overarching goal of BBG is to become a global leader in eCommerce. Perhaps one of the best strategies that Berlin Brands Group employs is its scaling of the smaller companies to achieve a huge growth that captures a larger part of the market share within the respective consumer industries. They’re on a roll and picking up speed.
19. Berlin Brands Group is expanding its workforce
According to LinkedIn, there are currently 510 employees working for Berlin Brands Group. The company is making good on its promise to grow the infrastructure and increase the headcount of its workforce. It has listed 208 new job openings on the LinkedIn website, which is well over a third of its current workforce. It’s a big undertaking that shows the company means business about growing its reach.
20 Berlin Brands Group is building key locations
We were interested in learning more about the pending expansion of the Berlin Brands group. When we pored over the job announcements listed on Linked In we saw that most of the new jobs are for workers in key locations throughout Germany and Slovakia. This is a concentrated focus on the headquarters to solidify the infrastructure and make its presence in Slovakia even stronger than it currently is. This is a brilliant strategy that lays the groundwork for fortifying its posturing at home and within Slovakia for later expansion into other global markets. It will provide a more solid base from which the company can continue its global expansion efforts. This is a company that is worth keeping your eye on as the outlook for its continued success is extremely sunny.
