London, 14th March 2016 – L’Equipe launches L’Équipe Store, the L’Équipe Marketplace, specialising in the sale of sports goods. With this move, L’Équipe aims to explore a new way of generating revenue from its audiences.

L’Équipe is currently France’s leading cross-media sports brand, with more than 29 million French people coming into contact with the brand every month (Médiamétrie cross-media study 2015).

Launched on 18 February 2016, L’Équipe Store already offers a range of 70,000 sports products distributed by 30 specialist retailers and benchmark sports brands. These brands cover almost all of the 70 disciplines covered by L’Équipe newspaper, ranging from football and running, to skiing and badminton, taking in fitness training and bodybuilding along the way. The catalogue is currently being expanded, and will eventually offer several hundred thousand products.

“The launch of a Marketplace in the world of sport is a natural opportunity for us”, explains Emmanuel Alix, Director of L’Équipe Group’s Digital Hub. “The audience of L’Équipe’s website is both qualified and influential. We want to experiment with this diversification, which will give our audience an extra service, while keeping in touch with our natural universe, which is sport. Once we have assessed the initial results of this launch, we are planning a rapid extension of our range of products into new segments, such as outdoor leisure, for example.”

Mirakl’s SaaS (Software as a Service) Marketplace Platform, a world leader, is providing all the new functionality for the solution, helping L’Équipe’s Marketplace waste no time in reaching the highest standards in e-commerce buying experience.

Meanwhile, L’Équipe is using its know-how to draw up a suitable product promotion strategy. “Our aim is to promote the products on the basis of current sporting events, so that they are fully incorporated with our range of site content, while maintaining our priority to have total control over delivering a quality customer experience,” Emmanuel Alix goes on to say.

Philippe Corrot, co-founder and manager of Mirakl adds: “The cooperation between L’Équipe and Mirakl illustrates our ability to work alongside the media in their transformation: for them, the Marketplace constitutes a lever to diversify their source of income. Although the platform is up and running, we will continue to support L’Équipe to ensure that its Marketplace remains up to date and continues to be a benchmark for sports fans.”