When German e-commerce expert Stefan Wenzel took the stage of the K5 conference last week to show a satellite photo of the Atacama Desert — where unsold fashion goes to die — you could hear a pin drop.

His thesis: Sales-led commerce is broken, the numbers have proven it for years, and the industry has simply chosen not to look.

Ingrid and Valerie were there in the stage hall, and they have thoughts.

In this episode, we talk about the K5 theses that actually hurt: why endless growth targets have turned into margin pressure, dead stock and return chaos; why “Made in China” may no longer mean cheap copy, but faster, better and smarter; and why Europe should be very careful before confusing resignation with strategy.

We also ask whether authenticity is really the last human advantage in an AI-heavy commerce world — or just the next buzzword everyone will put into a LinkedIn post.

And then there is the topic that was glaringly missing from the big stage: recommerce. Second-hand, refurbished, circular models — one of the most European AND growing commerce stories out there. So why was everyone only talking about AI?

A sweaty, sharp and slightly uncomfortable debrief after Germany's most relevant e-commerce conference about broken growth logic, Chinese speed, European blind spots and the things the industry still prefers not to see.