Booktopia’s CMO, Steffen Daleng, is leaving the business as part of restructure that will ultimately see a headcount reduction of between 30-40 people.

Todays news follows on from an announcement by the business earlier this week that its had completed a comprehensive review of costs and pathways to enhanced efficiencies. As a result of the review the company said it had implemented initiatives to deliver approximately $12-15 million of annualised improvements to its earnings to be primarily realised in FY24 and beyond.

Among the cost saving measures announced;

• $1-2 million in advertising costs optimisation – advertising program to focus more on high-conversion channels. 
• Margin optimisation to deliver $2-3 million by adjusting the pricing on various products to reflect increasing costs and improve overall gross margins.
• The company has also changed how it recovers third-party delivery costs resulting in a $4-5 million annualised earnings improvement.

Daleng was part of the team under founder and former CEO Tony Nash who took the company from a $110m privately owned ecommerce business to a $240m revenue ASX listed retail leader in the ecommerce sector.

The pandemic proved a boon for the company and by mid 2021 Daleng was predicting sales of a billion dollars within the decade. The company's sophisticated tech would help it get there. "I have an algorithm that can start calculating how we’re going to be landing at the end of the day...my team can quickly shift any kind of advertising spend in the moment. And we do. It’s not just wishful thinking."

The business has had a rocky few years, benefitting from the surge in ecommerce during the early days of the pandemic – its revenues of $240m in 2022 are almost double what they where in 2019. But poor profitability (it lost $15m last year) has seen its market capitalisation fall from a high of $400m to just $26m by the middle of 2022.

Nash was forced out as CEO by the board in mid 2022, only to effectively resume control of the business after non-executive directors resigned in September. 

Throughout this period, Daleng had a ring side seat, but now he's moving on.

“It's been a fantastic adventure," he said. "A real page-turner with amazing characters and an excitingly changing story along the way. Now the story evolves and Booktopia starts a new chapter with different needs."

The company says it is looking to restructure of its operating cost base and infrastructure.

"Booktopia has been the home and incubator of some of Australia's best ecommerce and marketing talent the last four years and as I hand the baton to the next generation of marketing leaders I will continue to be their biggest supporter," Daleng added.

"I am grateful for the trust founder, Tony Nash put in me for all these years, and the time we had in growing Booktopia together to what it is today and I will continue to support him, acting CEO Geoff Stalley and the incoming CEO and executive team in the transition."