Influencers cry foul over delayed pay at Trell; 100 more staff leave firm amid troubles

Mumbai: Influencer-led video commerce platform Trell has not paid its dues to a section of content creators for the last 6-7 months, three creators told ET.

About 100 employees of Trell have either voluntarily left or been laid off from the company over the last two months, a source familiar with the developments said.

Trell, which was being investigated by a forensic team from EY India looking into alleged related-party transactions, incorrect reporting of business numbers, and other financial irregularities, had at one point worked with 1,000-1,500 creators, according to sources.


The sources added that it had not paid a "significant" number of creators.

ET could not, however, ascertain the exact figure.

The community page of Trell on Instagram had several comments from creators, such as “please clear the pending payments”, prodding the company to pay.

Trell was actively deleting these comments.

At least one creator also alleged that the company was only paying influencers with large followings on popular social media platforms like Instagram to avoid public shaming, while not paying creators with a relatively smaller number of followers.

Trell, on its part, denied the allegations.

“Trell has paid all its creators as per our contractual agreements with them. A certain percentage of creators work via their agencies. Trell has cleared payments with agencies as well,” the company said in a statement. “However, it has come to our notice that certain agencies have been delaying payments. While that is an agency-creator discrepancy, we have been actively working with them to ensure our creators are taken care of and payments are cleared at the earliest...”

Launched as a lifestyle-centric short video app, Trell gained prominence when video apps boomed on the back of a ban on Chinese short-video app TikTok in 2020.

At its core, Trell wanted to create a large base of content creators who would fuel its video commerce ambitions by selling products on Trell Shop, its online marketplace, to tier 2 and tier 3 audiences.

The marketplace features brands such as Lakme, Mamaearth, Maybelline, and Wow skincare.

Co-founder and chief executive Pulkit Agrawal had told ET earlier that as of July last year, Trell had trained over 1,000 creators, with the top ones earning as much as Rs 2 lakh a month.

“Everyone is facing this issue with them. They owe me more than Rs 30,000 for the promotion I did. As a student, it is a big amount for me,” said one lifestyle influencer who had a year-long contract that ended in March.

ET could verify that the company owed the influencer about Rs 35,000 as of June, based on a screenshot of its dashboard.

ET has also reviewed screenshots of a conversation between Trell and the influencer, which highlights how the company kept stalling the payment and did not respond to the creator’s query for clearance.

Until November last year, Trell had creators on payroll and paid them for creating content, one of sources said.

As the focus increased on monetising content and its marketplace, it tied creators' earnings for creating branded content and paying them 5% to 10% of the Trell Shop merchandise they sold.

Trell kept a percentage of the total gross merchandise value sold on the marketplace.

The company started unravelling three months ago amid an ongoing investigation by EY into its books of accounts, ET reported on March 12.

The EY forensics team was looking into alleged related-party transactions by its founders and other financial irregularities. In the same month, Trell laid off 300 employees amid growing uncertainty surrounding the company and talks of a funding round coming to a halt.

Trell also sold its 10% stake in AppsForBharat to an existing investor, Mirae Asset.

The secondary transaction amounting to $9-$9.5 million also saw Middle East investment fund MSA Novo buy AppsForBharat shares from the influencer-led video and shopping app, ET was the first to report on April 4.

Trell had raised more than $62 million as of July last year from Mirae Asset, H&M Group and LB Investments, as well as Sequoia Surge.