Swedish Bank Klarna to Hold Livestream Shopping Event

Once upon a time, QVC was the place to go for live shopping programming. A slew of companies is now entering the fray, including Swedish fintech firm Klarna, which will host its first-ever livestream shopping event in the US next month in a partnership with Cosmopolitan.

• Klarna held its first virtual shopping event in August, but not via livestream. That experiment drove 3x higher traffic to its app, compared to the average weekend in 2020.
• It also piloted live programming last November during six hour-long segments for European shoppers that drew more than 100,000 viewers.

This time around: Retailers including Macy’s, Adidas, Saks Off 5th, and Bluemercury will offer exclusive deals during the 48-hour virtual event, dubbed “Hauliday,” starting March 1. Klarna, which partners with 200,000+ retailers including Peloton and Sephora, provides customers interest-free payment plans on purchases.

Viewers will watch through retail streaming service ShopShops. But Klarna is looking to create or purchase its own platform this year, which would be available through its app.

Race to the top

“The ambition on my end is to create an ultra-modern QVC...without all the cheesy sales tactics and salespeople,” David Sandstrom, Klarna’s CMO, told Forbes. That’s not exactly a unique ambition.

A crowding space: On Tuesday, livestream commerce platform Talkshoplive announced it raised $3 million in seed funding to beef up its offering. In December, TikTok piloted its first shoppable livestream with Walmart. Instagram and Amazon have been tinkering with livestreaming since last year and 2019, respectively—and QVC debuted on YouTube TV last month with 3+ million subscribers.

Zoom out: Many platforms—and brands—think there’s something to this trend. But what about consumers? Andrew Lipsman, principal analyst at eMarketer, told Retail Brew livestreaming may not become a mainstream shopping behavior in the US though. But unlike QVC and HSN, livestreams targets Gen Z and millennial customers.

Lipsman did say that “brands in lifestyle categories should generally be looking to experiment with the medium, and it has the potential to be an important channel for new product launches.”