The Missing Millions

A Story of Scale, Stagnation, and the SaaS Pivot

APRIL 2026 // STRATEGY NARRATIVE

01. The Invisible Giant

Over the last 10 years, we built the plumbing of the food industry.

We are no longer a startup trying to find users. We have 183,000 buyers and over 3,300 active suppliers. Together, they have pumped £467.5 Million in invoice GMV through our platform across 14.3 million orders.

We won the scale game. But scale revealed a critical flaw in how we make money.

02. The Clue in the Data

We launched OrderAI. The response was incredible, but the revenue wasn't.

THE GOOD NEWS

In just 12 months, OrderAI volume skyrocketed by 3.3x (from 32k to 106k orders/month). Suppliers are routing all their business through it.

THE BAD NEWS

Our paying supplier count stayed perfectly flat at ~50. Out of 3,300 suppliers, 98.3% pay us nothing.

03. A Confirmed Learning

We tested a Buyer Insights subscription. The result was definitive: Buyers won't pay for it.

We sent sample price alert emails to thousands of buyers. High open rate. Zero conversions. Buyers feel their ordering data is theirs by right. Asking them to pay for it feels like being charged to read a bank statement.

THE HARD PIVOT

1. Kill the self-serve buyer subscription.
2. Shift 100% of self-serve monetisation focus to the Supplier side.
3. Move large 20+ location buyer chains to bespoke Enterprise Sales.

04. Hooking the Supplier

We break down the paywall by charging per-order, not per-month.

STEP 1: FREE

Basic marketplace orders. Free OrderAI mailbox to establish operational dependency.

STEP 2: CONNECT

£0.25/ORDER

Capped at £149/mo. Zero risk to start automating. A no-brainer upgrade.

STEP 3: PRO

£349/MO

AI-driven leads to new restaurants. We stop selling tools, we start selling Growth.

05. The Supplier Flywheel

Every tier is designed to naturally pull the supplier into the next.
01 Supplier joins FREE & starts receiving app orders.
02 Forwards off-platform emails to the free OrderAI mailbox.
03 Upgrades to CONNECT (£0.25/order) to handle the new volume.
04 Sees weekly "Promo Digest" of missed searches ➔ Upgrades to PRO (£349).
05 Pro Leads bring new restaurants to the supplier.
06 Supplier grows, easily justifying the recurring Pro fee.

06. Stopping the Bleeding

If we 10x our supplier base, our support team will collapse under the weight of refunds.

We have processed nearly 28,000 refunds manually. Rekki staff act as mediators.

THE FIX: SELF-SERVICE DISPUTE PORTAL

We remove ourselves from the loop. The buyer snaps a photo of a damaged item in-app. The supplier clicks "Accept" on their dashboard. The system auto-generates the credit note. Zero Rekki staff involved.

07. The £963K Conclusion

This isn't a pipe dream. It's math based on our existing CRM.

If we convert just 9% of our dormant suppliers to these new tiers:

Segment Target Users New Monthly Revenue
Connect (Tier 2)300 Suppliers£44,700 MRR
Connect Pro (Tier 3)100 Suppliers£34,900 MRR
Enterprise Buyers5 Groups (Direct Sales)£625 MRR
£963K NEW ARR

08. Making It Happen

What we do tomorrow morning.
  • Step 1: The Connect Rescue. Email the 129 suppliers who trialed Connect and dropped off. Offer them the £0.25/order pricing.
  • Step 2: The Promo Push. Email 199 suppliers their AI-generated promotion suggestions. Show them the exact leads they are missing. Upgrading to Pro unlocks them.
  • Step 3: The Dispute Portal. Fast-track the self-service refund UI so operations can breathe.