Mark Zuckerberg is quietly sitting on a shopping empire with four times the customers of Amazon, as Facebook Marketplace skyrockets

Zuckerberg is growing an ecommerce empire in Facebook Marketplace. — Bloomberg/Getty Images/The New York Times

Ethan Gaskill, a 29-year-old content creator, begins everyday the same way: “When I wake up in the morning – most people get on their phone and start checking Instagram – I check Facebook Marketplace.”

With his Los Angeles home furnished almost exclusively with second-hand items and a TikTok with over 220,000 followers interested in his thrifty hauls, Gaskill trusts the shopping platform to be a reliable source for hidden gems: a thousand-dollar (RM4,694) Herman Miller light and pendant he nabbed for US$400 (RM1,877); a US$5,000 (RM23,472) bed from the same designer he bought for 20% of the original price; and, a Founders mid-century dresser worth US$4,000 (RM18,776) that Gaskill got for US$800 (RM3,755).