Naspers shut the site down and delisted its apps without warning on Tuesday, 1 February. It directed OLX website visitors to its other classifieds businesses — AutoTrader and Property24. “I think the closure of OLX does speak to some of the big trends that are happening in the classifieds industry at the moment,” Gumtree SA general manager Claire Cobbledick told the Money Show’s Bruce Whitfield in an interview on Talk 702. “Although there is definitely a lot going on and a lot changing, I don’t think it speaks to the end of classifieds,” she said.

“I think it’s just an area that we are entering into that’s pretty different from where we’ve been before.” Cobbledick explained that specific segments of the classifieds market, including players such as AutoTrader and Property24, tend to be easier to monetise than other marketplaces. “I think that’s one key dynamic,” she added. One significant disruption to South Africa’s classifieds market was the emergence of Facebook Marketplace in the country, Cobbledick said. “The entrance of Facebook, who has already such a scale in their social platform, makes the category that much more challenging.”

Gumtree launched in South Africa in 2005, and it promptly established itself as a dominant player in the classifieds market. Naspers launched OLX in the country in 2011 and began competing directly with local classifieds platforms Bidorbuy and Gumtree. Cobbledick explained how difficult it is to grow in the classifieds sector when there are already dominant players in the market. “It is a real struggle to dislodge a first mover. Once a big player comes in [and] gains critical mass, it takes a huge amount to steal share,” she said. “We had tracked [OLX] over time.

OLX had made gains in some provinces, in some categories, but had struggled to assume dominance and take over from the position that Gumtree had established in the market.” She believes that this would have contributed to Naspers’ closure of OLX and that its termination could help Gumtree in the market. “Naspers is a formidable competitor, and OLX has really taken us head-on over the years, so it is good news from a Gumtree point of view,” she said. “We’ve seen some of the OLX users migrating to the platform since what was a very abrupt closure.” Cobbledick reiterated that she did not believe the classifieds industry was dying. “The need for classifieds is only growing and developing. From a category point of view, there really is growth in this area,” she said.