The downfall of the 'lowest price laptop company'... In the back, Gmarket and competitors' power-hungry alliance'

2023-05-03 02:58:17

Gmarket suspends discounts given to stores
Reflecting the demands of competitor Ohjin

Company A, which sells laptops in Gmarket, is an uncertified company that has not signed a contract with a manufacturer. Unlike its own company, G Market provided a discount to company A in order to make company A’s laptop, which is not the cheapest, at the lowest price on Naver Shopping, a price comparison site. It was a ‘win-win discount’ in which company A sold more products and Gmarket collected sales commissions. However, G Market’s discount offer was cut off without prior notice, and Company A’s sales performance also declined.

Behind that, there was a ‘gap-jil alliance’ between Gmarket and Ohjin, a top-ranking company in the laptop sales market. The beginning of this case, which was disclosed by the Fair Trade Commission on the 3rd, was in 2020.

Ohjin, which sells laptops after being certified as an official seller by laptop manufacturers, is a threat to non-certified companies whose sales are on the rise.felt Non-certified companies targeted consumers with low product prices without official certification. Non-certified companies lowered product prices by selling imported goods or reselling products bought cheaply at event prices.

In response, Jin Oh pressured Gmarket to not give discount coupons (PCS coupons) to non-certified companies. The PCS coupon is a discount policy provided by Gmarket to stores that sell products at the lowest price within the company. This is to lower the consumer exposure price if the product is not the lowest price on price comparison sites such as Naver Shopping and Danawa. A laptop that a entrant has posted on Gmarket for 1 million won is sold for 950,000 won on Naver Shopping when a 50,000 won PCS coupon is applied.am.

Gmarket eventually accepted Ohjin’s request, even though it could increase commission revenue by increasing sales through the issuance of PCS coupons. This is because Ohjin, a large seller in the notebook sector in Gmarket, could not be ignored. Gmarket deleted 737 PCS coupons paid to a number of non-certified companies from April 2020 to May of the following year. In this process, not only were they not notified in advance of the reason for the deletion, but they were also not notified afterwards.

The Fair Trade Commission judged that G Market and Ohjin Co. had committed ‘abuse of trading position’ and issued a corrective order to prevent them from doing the same. In addition, a fine of 15 million won was added to Ohjin Trading Company. An official from the Fair Trade Commission said, “It is an unfair trade practice for an open market to unilaterally give disadvantages to a company entering a store without a reasonable reason.”

Kyungdam Park reporter [email protected]