“I try my best not to follow and part of my job is to have our team not follow it either, which is tough because there are a lot of incentive structures surrounding ,” Kogan tellsAs we discuss Kogan’s new strategy, the online retailer’s share price is plummeting., which revealed a 6.2 per cent decline in sales to $178 million over the first three months of the year.
“We did learn an important lesson during COVID-19,” Kogan says. “At the start of COVID-19 Aussies were relying on us for survival essentially. Where am I going to get my monitor, my office chair, my mask, sanitiser? All of that. Since the July 2022 low, the share price had been gradually rebuilding back over $8 as the business changed tack, until last Wednesday.Kogan, a son of migrants from Belarus, is not phased, claiming the market has yet to properly understand his new strategy.“The share price is one data point, but it’s often not that reflective of what’s going on in the business right now,” he says.
“You’ve got physical boxes and you need to physically move them, so we have accelerated our transition, which was already happening, to become more a software platform, rather than a traditional retailer. “I go to the footy and sit at the MCG and look at the packed crowd and think, ‘We’ve got five times this in Kogan FIRST subscribers’,” he says, although he quickly admits, as an Essendon supporter, he watches more US basketball games than AFL.
“I love doing this and can’t see myself doing anything else, but that could change in the future. I can’t think of anything else. I don’t have to be here,” Kogan says. “It’s the most exciting the business has ever been.”