EBay founder Pierre Omidyar and the company's first CEO, Meg Whitman, in 1998 James D. Wilson / Getty Images
In 1995, Frank Fraser was looking for a laser pointer to use in his presentations.
Driven away by its prices, which were then skyrocketing to $ 100, this Canadian engineer tried unsuccessfully to build his own.
Somewhere on the burgeoning
World Wide Web he
found his plan C and bought a broken laser pointer in order to repair it himself.
Shortly after, he was contacted by Pierre Odmiyar, the owner of the website where he had made the transaction.
This 28-year-old computer programmer had launched AuctionWeb on September 3, 1995 and did not expect that the first sale would be a useless object that he had uploaded to the portal to test its operation.
Two years later, that website was renamed eBay.
And in these 25 years he has seen plenty of oddities to confirm the epic era of the initial exchange: cities, military planes, football stadiums and a half-eaten cheese sandwich in which, presumably, have passed (among others) the face of the Virgin Mary was shown.
“You can buy things on eBay that you won't find anywhere else.
It is part of the beauty of the platform ”, says Jorge Herrero, director of Innovation, Business Development and Loyalty of eBay in southern Europe.
Although the platform was born as an auction portal where mainly second-hand items were offered - and thus became a pioneer of the circular economy - it has seen the presence of sellers who offer new items grow over the years.
"Our purpose is clear to create opportunities for SMEs and freelancers in a context where commerce is increasingly global and more digital.
That was the speech of the founder when he started and it continues to be the purpose on which everything is built ”, explains Beatriz Reyero, Global Vice President of Strategy and Consumer Knowledge.
First employee
Odmiyar had created the eBay seed in one weekend and as a personal project "dedicated to bringing buyers and sellers together in an open and honest market."
Nine months later, in June 1996, he hired his first employee, Chris Argapao, to help coordinate the growing online operations.
“Pierre was best man at my sister's wedding… When I told him I was unhappy at my job, he scratched his beard thinking.
And then he said: I may have something on the way for you, in the future.
He called me two weeks later, ”Argapao recalls on the company's corporate website.
During its first two years of life, this online auction showcase maintained a monthly growth of between 20% and 50%.
So much so, that in 1997 the first million objects sold was reached.
Meanwhile, Odmiyar and his small but growing staff worked at full speed to prevent an overload from taking down the web.
And they succeeded… Until June 10, 1999. That day, the site suffered a fall that lasted for just under 20 hours.
With the turn of the millennium, global expansion begins.
In July 1999, eBay launched the websites for Germany, Australia and the United Kingdom.
It would not arrive in Spain until 2002, with the option to
buy now
integrated as an alternative to the classic bidding system and with a plane sold for 4.9 million dollars crowning its record auctions.
Herrero was precisely the first employee of the company in our country.
He joined in 2006 as Marketing Manager for Spain.
"Due to my technological concerns, I evolved to understand and solve the problems of buyers and sellers within our ecosystem," he says.
EBay's history also includes a long list of acquisitions, most notably the purchase of Paypal and Skype.
The former separated from its parent company in 2015 to become an independent company, 70% of the latter was sold in 2009 and the remaining 30% went to Microsoft in 2011. And over the years, the name of Warren Buffett.
The tycoon organizes an annual charity auction that in 2019 reached a record bid of 4.6 million dollars.
The bestiary of auctions
Lives, hair and presidents
In the most personal section of the auctioned objects, Martian sales have been registered, such as the one promoted by the writer Ian Usher after his divorce.
The offer, described as his "entire life" included his home in Perth, his belongings, meeting his friends and the chance to try his job.
It sold for $ 380,000.
In 2006, the hair salon where Britney Spears performed her famous head shave tried to sell the singer's hair, but eBay deactivated the auction.
And in 2016 the also frustrated auction of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi took place in a prank following her claim that she would sell herself if she could to raise funds for the country.
Of military planes and sunken ships
In 2004, Mike Landa tried to sell an FA-18 Hornet.
This dilapidated military plane was presented on eBay with a minimum bid of one million dollars.
Landa offered to fix it for whoever used the 'buy it now' option and paid 9 million, but there were no buyers.
The auction of four German warships ... and sunk ones was completed, for £ 85,000.
A never seen fossil and hedgehog
Although eBay does not support the sale of pets or, in general, live animals (certain insects, live bait or tadpoles, among others are accepted), the platform has also made headlines for its contributions to the knowledge of global diversity.
In 2006, the shell of a hedgehog led to the identification of a new species, and in 2008 a fossil subsequently identified as a
new, old
type of aphid
was sold
.
In contrast to the diverse products that pass through eBay, the portal that accommodates them has changed relatively little over time.
While other web giants have gone through redesigns that have turned even the company's very logo upside down, eBay's look has
roughly
held steady.
Herrero attributes it to the heterogeneity of the users of the twenty-something web.
"We have a very heterogeneous base: some have been using eBay since 1995. The challenge is to create a user experience that accompanies those we already have and gradually introduce functionalities that improve the experience of those who are joining them."
In this sense, the procession (of changes) goes inside: artificial intelligence has already entered to personalize searches based on the type of user and their preferences.
Not surprisingly, eBay accumulates 25 years of knowledge about those who come to buy and sell at this great virtual bazaar.
Image search functionalities and translation systems, among other services, have also been integrated into the platform.
Ebay today (and tomorrow)
Taking advantage of this database is, according to Reyero, one of the great challenges posed by the immediate future of the company.
Generation Z
is already coming to the edge of eBay
,
which - just like the previous ones - is not like the old ones.
“These are the future user.
Understanding them and doing it well is a challenge for all companies.
They are people who are super adapted to the Internet, they live on social networks, they only use their mobile phones, they are demanding, they have no patience at all, they are used to everything being super personalized ... ”, he assures.
A large number of physical businesses have also recently arrived on the platform, looking on the Internet for an alternative showcase with which to compensate for the losses caused by the pandemic.
“Our initial purpose becomes crucial at this time.
That is why we have had many aid programs for SMEs ”, adds the executive.
Is it a temporary increase?
Reyero doesn't think so.
Although she does not rule out that in a hypothetical return to normalcy, eBay's activity will decline, she is convinced that a good part of the newcomers will maintain that presence.
“People have acquired habits, fear has been removed.
They are structural changes and we are seeing it: they are maintained after confinement ”.
And in 25 years?
Reyero imagines an even bigger eBay, but anchored in the purpose of serving as a meeting point.
“We invented e-commerce.
Now it has developed and has a lot of future, and we are going to continue on that wave, but maintaining our philosophy ”.