Digital entrepreneurs are usually presented as young, urban, well-educated individuals working for innovative start-ups. In sharp contrast with this “hipster” view, this research identifies digital subsistence entrepreneurs as a new type of entrepreneurs that recently appeared in developed countries. To do so, it investigates buy-and-sell activities on Facebook groups using a multi-method approach involving in-depth interviews, netnography, and participatory observation. The findings indicate that digital subsistence entrepreneurs’ activities pertain to survival entrepreneurship rather than transformative entrepreneurship. Nonetheless, they satisfy more than purely financial needs, also providing hedonic (spending time with family, creating), relational (meeting new people) and symbolic benefits (raising self-esteem, redefining roles at home and in society). This research also shows that subsistence entrepreneurs’ rebirth in developed countries is founded on the structural, cognitive and relational forms of social capital that are grounded in peer-to-peer platforms digital features. It thus offers interesting contributions and implications for public policy makers engaged in the regulation of the sharing economy.

Introduction

Since seminal work initiated by Schumpeter in the 30’s, various definitions of entrepreneurs have been discussed, generally involving the common idea of individuals exploiting market opportunities through innovation (e.g. Van Stel et al., 2005; Venkataraman, 1997). Within this rich literature, a specific stream of research on “digital entrepreneurship” has recently emerged to investigate research questions at the intersection of digital technologies and entrepreneurship (Nambisan, 2017). In this perspective, digital entrepreneurs are usually depicted as young, well-educated and urban opportunity-driven entrepreneurs, benefiting from influent social networks and a combination of up-to-date technical and business skills (Zaheer et al., 2018) and launching start-ups with the ambition to become the next Uber, AirBnb, Salesforce or Spotify. In sharp contrast with this hipster cliché, the present article adopts an original angle about digital entrepreneurs, by identifying digital subsistence entrepreneurs as a new type of entrepreneurs that recently appeared in developed countries. Digital entrepreneurship is defined as a form of entrepreneurship with an emphasis on leveraging new digital technologies, such as digital platforms (Parker et al., 2016) that match among producers and consumers and facilitate the exchange of goods and services. It may seem surprising at first glance to make bridges between digital and subsistence entrepreneurs as the latter usually trigger the contrasting image of poor micro-entrepreneurs selling rice cakes in India or any other developing country. Still, a recent study commissioned by France’s Ministry for the Economy and Financial Affairs shows that for 9% of sellers, the money made from selling on peer-to-peer (P2P) platforms can account for more than half of their income (DGE, 2015).