"1 Woman, 1 Passion" podcasts - Episode#1: Osanna Orlowski, Founder of Collector Square
Valérie Bokobza: Hello everyone, I'm Valérie Bokobza, Director of Development at Societe Generale Private Banking and I'm delighted to present a new episode of "1 woman, 1 passion". Our goal is to share the journey of a woman entrepreneur who is moving the lines. Today, I welcome Osanna Orlowski. Hello Osanna!
Osanna Orlowski: Hello Valérie.
Valérie Bokobza: You are co-founder of Collector Square, an innovative platform that offers second-hand luxury items. After a successful experience in an auditing and consulting firm, you decided to launch your online site in 2014 with Nicolas Orlowski, chairman at Artcurial. Collector Square has established itself as the essential platform for second-hand products in the luxury goods industry in Europe. You are a visionary woman, offering a second life to timeless accessories. Your commitment combines profitability and circular economy(1) to contribute to a more responsible world. Osanna, how does one go from financial auditor to responsible luxury entrepreneur?
Osanna Orlowski: Listen, for me, financial auditing was in some ways an additional cycle after business school, after HEC, and after three or four years, I clearly wanted to move on and change quite radically. Entrepreneurship tempted me enormously and it was finally Nicolas Orlowski who helped me to take the plunge and to launch myself into this adventure with him. Obviously, in an entrepreneurial adventure, the casting is ideal and the presence of Nicolas Orlowski has been decisive, by his experience as an entrepreneur and also his knowledge of both the luxury market and the intermediation business. And I think that for them to take the plunge, you have to trust yourself, and then you have to take the plunge, sometimes without thinking!
Valérie Bokobza: Thank you Osanna. Protecting the planet by linking the economy and the circular economy, is this a vocation for you?
Osanna Orlowski: Listen, I think that we are thinking more and more about our behaviors, our way of consuming with regard to the environment and the planet. I am sensitive to this, but I notice that our clients are really concerned about very broad and deep issues and the sustainability axis seems essential to me. With Collector Square, finally, we have really chosen to focus on objects that have a long life cycle and therefore allow different lives. Our Collector Square model is to offer the possibility to these objects to have different lives, through resale. Finally, it is thanks to this fluidity that these pieces become investment pieces. Finally, they allow you to combine a pleasure dimension with an investment dimension because you enjoy these pieces, but at the same time you know that they have a real liquidity(2). Concretely, that we can resell them, if we want, to buy something else, or to do something else, quite simply. This axis of sustainability is really essential. We have also chosen to take the path of sustainability in the development of our company, through our business model, since we have been a profitable company for two years and we have chosen, certainly, to seek maximum growth - we have a growth between 30% and 40% - but at the same time, we have reasoned, with investments that are always oriented by logics of return and profitability. So we are not in a frantic race for growth at any price, but in a reasoned growth.
Valérie Bokobza: Osanna, what advice would you have liked to have been given as a woman at the beginning of your career?
Osanna Orlowski: First of all, it's pretty basic, but I would say, trust yourself, since, ultimately, I notice that many of the obstacles that arise in our journeys are obstacles that we put up ourselves. So, trust yourself and free yourself. And the second would be to give a lot of importance to people. Today, the talents at Collector Square, the team, are really key elements in the success of our project.
Valérie Bokobza: Very good. So, just on the human side, the health crisis has come and gone. What has Covid fundamentally changed for you?
Osanna Orlowski: It's mainly in terms of our business and our customers that we've seen an impact. We have clearly seen an acceleration in the digitalization of our business. Even if our activity has always been mostly Web, mostly digital - between 70% and 80% before Covid - Covid has really accelerated and removed obstacles for customers who were less used to e-commerce. We even set a sales record by selling a watch for nearly 90 million euros, a Patek Philippe watch that was 100% online, to a client who had not seen it. So we saw that this was a real gas pedal. Internally, finally, in our work organization, the Covid has not changed much, insofar as we have a commercial business and most of our teams are in contact with the objects, the customers and the physical presence is necessary. On the other hand, it has helped us to put in place tools to communicate more easily and effectively, especially at a distance, sometimes.
Valérie Bokobza: Thank you Osanna. Societe Generale Private Banking thanks you for these exchanges. I'll see you in the next podcast "1 woman, 1 passion". Thank you, goodbye!
(1) The circular economy is about producing goods and services in a sustainable way by limiting the consumption and waste of resources and the production of waste. It is about moving from a throwaway society to a more circular economic model. (Source: French Ministry of Ecological Transition - https://www.ecologie.gouv.fr/leconomie-circulaire )
(2) These goods can be bought or sold quickly without any major impact on their price. (see the website of the AMF - https://www.amf-france.org/fr/espace-epargnants/savoir-bien-investir/cadrer-son-projet/placements-que-savoir-sur-la-liquidite-0#:~:text=Un%20actif%20financier%20(actions%2C obligations,cet actif peut être échangé)
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