The eBay Government Relations team recently hosted 9 eBay small business owners from across Italy in Rome for an Advocacy Day event. The sellers met with members of the Italian Senate’s Industry Committee and the Parliamentary Group on Innovation to present our new Italy Small Online Business Inclusive Growth Report. The team presented highlights from the report, including the stunning figure that 96% of the mostly small- and medium-sized Italian companies selling on eBay also sell cross-border – compared to just 5.8% of traditional Italian small- and medium-sized businesses.

Our eBay small business participants were joined by two eBay executives: Cathy Foster, VP of Global Government Relations & Public Policy and Isa Mueller-Wegner, VP of Emerging European Countries Operations. Our VPs had two additional meetings during the day with Minister of Economy and Finance Giovanni Tria and the U.S. Ambassador to Italy Lewis M. Eisenberg. These 2 meetings were mainly focused on value added tax (VAT) collection regulation and digital services tax, both of which are very important issues to eBay customers in Europe.

Everyone involved in this event agreed it was a highly productive day. eBay would like to thank the 9 eBay sellers who took time away from their families and their businesses to advocate for all Italian internet-enabled small businesses and eBay entrepreneurs.