When we checked in on eBay Now last fall, its leaders were brimming with optimism, announcing plans to bring the same-day delivery option to 25 more cities by the end of 2014. Skip forward to today, however, and it’s apparently a different story. VentureBeat sources claim that the service is in serious trouble; in addition to losing executives and getting rid of first-party drivers, eBay Now is reportedly “blowing a ton of resources” and may be near shutting down. While the speedy courier option has done well during busy holiday shopping seasons, it reportedly doesn’t have enough day-to-day business to stay afloat.
Two years after launching its local delivery service eBay Now, eBay plans to shut it down, a VentureBeat source claims. Born out of the $75 million acquisition of Milo, eBay’s local team launched eBay Now in 2012 alongside competing same-day services like WunWun and Postmates. The race to conquer local delivery is red-hot — recent entrants include none other than Google and Uber – but despite eBay’s head start, the company may ultimately sit this one out. Things aren’t well on eBay’s local team, sources say. At the end of April, eBay quietly fired its team of “valets,” and transferred its deliveries to third-party couriers, a shift enabled by the company’s earlier acquisition of Shutl. Simultaneously, eBay’s director of local commerce and East Coast operations head departed. Since then, the company has ended its relationship with early retail partners, including Best Buy*. The service is blowing a ton of resources, one source claims, and may not last, prompting eBay to walk away from pricing deals with retailers.
