#7 - Scaling Product-as-a-Service at Decathlon: The Transformation Playbook

The "Subscription Trap": Why most retailers failwhere Decathlon succeeded. Product-as-a-Service (PaaS) sounds simple in a boardroom. Inreality? It’s a total rewiring of the retail DNA.

I sat down with Yann Carré to deconstruct how Decathlon scaled from zero to multi-million GMV in just afew years. The secret wasn't the "idea" it was the plumbing.

To win at PaaS, you have to solve the "unsexy" fundamentals:

•⁠ ⁠The Cash Gap: Moving from €200 upfront to €12/month (andfixing sales incentives so your team doesn't revolt).

•⁠ ⁠The Asset Lifecycle: Trackingvalue as it depreciates, then refurbishing it for a second (and third) life.

•⁠ ⁠The Risk Factor: Fraud looksdifferent when your inventory is living in someone’s garage,not your warehouse.

•⁠ ⁠The Billing Nightmare:"Quote-to-cash" at scale is a different beast than a standard POStransaction.

The CEO-level takeaway:
You cannot "bolt-on" a subscription model to a legacy business. Ifit’s treated as a "nice pilot," it will die as one. Decathlon wonbecause they treated it as a business transformation, not an experiment.

👇Deep dive into the journey here:
🎧Spotify
🎧Apple Podcast