The sharing economy has become popular thanks to companies such as Airbnb, Glovo, TalentHackers, Housers, Amovens, Stubhub… platforms whose business model has burst into the Spanish market in the last two years.
In 2011, Time magazine published that the sharing economy would change the world, today, the potential market for these businesses is expected to reach $570 billion by 2025.
Figures in Spain
AECOC’s ShopperView department has published a study, “Monographic on the Collaborative Economy”, with the aim of discovering the latest market trends and giving a boost to companies on their path to digtial transformation.
It shows that 57% of the Spanish population has used some collaborative platform in the last year. And in addition, 60% of the Spaniards intend to use them in the near future. It is understood that these types of platforms will increase in the coming years thanks to the boom that is having among society.
According to the data provided by the research, in the last year the 47% thy population has used online collaborative economy platforms to buy and sell second-hand products, such as Wallapop or MIlanuncios. While the 13% has used websites such as Airbnb, which allow you to share a flat during travels, followed by the 11% to share car or motorbike using platforms like BlaBlaCar, the 5% to rent rooms in shared flats in Badi o Habitoom, the 3% to hire babysitting services for pets through apps like Dogbuddy and the 3% to rent products between people who are in the same geographical area, as can be done through Ralendo.
Users
This new form of consumption mainly attracts the attention of the younger population, thus, the 58% who declares to be very interested in the use of collaborative platforms is between the ages of 25 and 34. While 30% of the population between 65 and 75 years old say they are interested in them.
New modalities
Alongside the concept of a sharing economy, two new aspects are born: the economy on demand and the access economy.
Economy on demand means any activity that involves a commercial relationship between users and professionals. In which financial consideration is given. This category includes home delivery services, for example Glovo, which is considered a collaborative platform, but through which the delivery person benefits financially.
On the other hand, the economy of access occurs when a company provides the service and makes available to a set of users some goods for temporary use. Examples of this are practices such as “carsharing”, which allow to share a car, owned by the company that owns the platform, among several people in a non-simultaneous way. An example of this would be Bluemove, Respite or Forward.
Rise of collaborative platforms
The proliferation of social media and the increased use of technology are key reasons for the expansion and growth of collaborative platforms in recent years. The sectors where this increase has been most noticeable have been tourism, with platforms such as Airbnb, and the transport sector, with examples such as BlaBlaCar, Uber, HomeAway or Rentalia. But that is not to say that other areas do not also accuse this exponential growth, a sign of this would be the TalentHacker platform, in the world of human resources.
All this new current that revolves around collaborative platforms does not seek to uncover traditional models. But broaden horizons and reinvent itself, and it is that the use of such platforms highlights the efficiency of the reduction of intermediaries.
Advances in innovation around service delivery facilitate the immediacy and empowerment of users, thanks to the security and confidence offered by these platforms. It can be stated with all this that, we are facing a change in the way we consume, since this new approach allows people to interact with each other and become providers that provide services to other users, obtaining in return benefits that do not they must always be economical.
