azrieli.com
Azrieli.com is the former online shopping site of Israel’s Azrieli Group, and it is no longer open for purchases today.
What is Azrieli.com today?
The current Azrieli.com website is a simple notice that tells visitors the shopping service closed for purchases on December 22, 2023.
This means people who visit the domain today will not find the large online store that once operated there.
The page mainly gives former users information about removing their email address from Azrieli Group marketing messages.
Azrieli Group also confirmed in its corporate reporting that it stopped the e-commerce operation connected with Azrieli.com in December 2023.
What did people once buy on Azrieli.com?
Azrieli.com was built as a broad online marketplace rather than a store focused on one kind of product.
It offered items for the home and office, electronics, sports, children, babies, beauty, pets, camping, cars, and other everyday needs.
The idea was simple: Azrieli wanted to take the shopping experience linked with its physical malls and build a major digital shopping business around the same brand.
That strategy made sense because Azrieli Group was already a major owner and operator of shopping centers in Israel.
How did Azrieli.com begin?
The story started before the Azrieli.com shopping site had its familiar name.
Azrieli Group bought the e-commerce activity of Buy2 in 2016 for about NIS 62 million, according to Israeli business newspaper Globes.
The company then launched the Azrieli.com brand in February 2017 as the replacement for Buy2.
This move showed that Azrieli wanted to grow beyond buildings and become important in online retail too.
For several years, Azrieli Group reports described Azrieli.com as one of the company’s additional business activities alongside its much larger property operations.
Why did Azrieli.com close?
The biggest problem was money because the online business struggled to become profitable.
Calcalist reported that the operation accumulated losses of roughly NIS 313 million over its life.
Another Calcalist report described the total as around $90 million and said most of the site's roughly 70 workers were expected to lose their jobs when the operation closed.
The Jerusalem Post also reported large financial losses as the main reason behind the shutdown.
These reports show how hard a large online marketplace can be to run even when a strong company and famous brand stand behind it.
Online stores need more than shoppers because they also need strong delivery systems, customer service, technology, marketing, product supply, and enough profit on each sale to cover all those costs.
Is Azrieli Group still in business?
Yes, and this is an important difference because the end of Azrieli.com did not mean the end of Azrieli Group.
The Azrieli Group corporate website describes the company as a large real estate business focused on developing, owning, and managing properties that produce income.
Its activities include malls, offices, senior housing, rental homes, hotels, residential projects, and other property businesses.
The group also has property interests outside Israel, including income-producing assets in the United States.
So Azrieli.com was only one part of a much larger company.
Why does Azrieli.com still matter?
Azrieli.com is useful as a business example because it shows that success in physical shopping centers does not automatically create success in online shopping.
A mall owner earns much of its money through property, rent, and long-term assets, while an online marketplace must compete every day on price, delivery, product choice, technology, and convenience.
Azrieli's experience also shows why companies test new businesses and sometimes leave them when the numbers do not work.
The original domain remains online, but visitors looking for the active Azrieli company should now use the official Azrieli Group website rather than expecting Azrieli.com to work as an online store.