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YDEON Group: Swedish Polhus and British OutdoorToys successfully integrated following acquisition

With the successful integration of the Swedish brand Polhus and the British brand OutdoorToys, Europe’s leading platform for garden projects, YDEON, expands its product range and doubles sales to 100 million euros in 2021.

Hamburg, 17th November 2022 – Whether it’s a garden shed, carport, sauna or climbing frame swing: whatever is needed for the garden can be found and purchased via the project platform of the Hamburg-based YDEON Group. This is the result of the full integration of Polhus and OutdoorToys into the already existing fast-growing company GartenHaus GmbH.

While GartenHaus previously offered garden and greenhouses, garages and carports, the Malmo-based company Polhus, founded in 2001, complements the range with saunas, wooden and Swedish houses. The Swedes give the group direct access to wood suppliers via locations in Eastern Europe. The British family-owned company OutdoorToys enlarges the product range on high-quality outdoor children’s play equipment such as play towers, climbing frames and swings, and brings strong expertise in modularization and individualized mass production of garden products.

The full integration of the two companies is part of a major transformation of the entire group. “We are not merely synchronizing distribution networks and supply chains – as is common with other e-commerce acquisitions – but building a completely new platform organization with additional category expertise by Polhus or OutdoorToys,” says Sebastian Arendt, CEO of YDEON. “This organizes itself in day-to-day business across companies along individual garden projects and thus enables the best customer experience in all garden projects on the market – and on just one platform.”

To build the group platform, YDEON has strong partners at its side. Florian Heinemann, Partner from investor Project A on technological integration through data hubs: “The data hubs, ERP and new customer and supplier portal as a joint project between YDEON and Project A ensure strong scalability through rapid technological connectivity of acquisitions, suppliers and sales partners. This makes YDEON’s strategy stand out in e-commerce buy & build.”

“It has enabled us to attract customers to other products across the group and significantly increases order value,” says Arendt. “With our acquisitions, we are now active not only in the DACH market, but also in Benelux, France, Scandinavia and the UK.”

In doing so, YDEON follows a consistent direct-to-consumer model. “The transformation and integration enables attractive sourcing, reasonable customer prices, and a good margin thanks to optimized, sustainable delivery without intermediaries,” explains Arendt. “Most importantly, customers are satisfied and recommend us to others.”

The YDEON Group and its three brands include over 20 online stores with more than 30,000 different products. This makes YDEON Europe’s leading online retailer of garden and greenhouse products, garages and carports, as well as saunas, pools and outdoor play equipment.

About YDEON

The YDEON Group, headquartered in Hamburg, combines the companies GartenHaus GmbH, Polhus and OutdoorToys under one roof. With over 20 online stores in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, France, Great Britain as well as in Norway, Sweden and Finland, among others, it is Europe’s leading digital platform for all type of garden projects. The company currently realizes completely digital projects for more than 200,000 customers, focusing on garden houses, saunas, pools, carports, greenhouses, patio roofs, children’s play equipment and much more. Either as a do-it-yourself project or as a full-service provider with project support and advice from the building application to the assembly and subsequent maintenance and care of the products. The product range includes over 30,000 items from more than 20 brands. The group employs more than 250 people. More information under www.ydeon.com.

Images: Polhus sweden houses + Rebo outdoortoys

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