Traffic can be a daily
nightmare in Lagos, Nigeria, where the roads get so jam packed that a short
journey can take a few hours; which is why Nigeria's emerging middle class is
turning to online shopping.
CNN’s Vladimir
Duthiers reports on the country’s recent appetite for e-commerce, sits with Sim
Shagaya;
Founder & CEO
at Konga Online Shopping Limited in an exclusive interview- Excerpt
Despite
poverty, political and ethnic divisions-- he believes the economic winds in Africa’s
most populous country are blowing in the right direction: Nigeria has been
growing at an average of seven percent over the past few years, it has an
expanding middle class, and more young consumers have disposable income.
But
it's not just income levels that are rising, for some - from 2000 to 2010, the
number of internet users rose from 200,000 to more than 40 million. The
internet is as if not more profound force than the printing press, then the
steam engine, and it represents a shift in the way society is structured and
the way commerce is done. Faced with
those statistics, shagaya says starting an e-commerce business was a
no-brainer.
I got to
participate in what people were calling the first dotcom boom, doing a lot of
work for online companies. The internet was really changing the way people were
doing business and even how society was structured and that influenced me
greatly. So when shagaya came back to Nigeria-- he launched konga.com.
Konga is
a retaileršits an online retailer that allows Nigerians to order someday
anything they want, from anywhere in the country where we will be able to get
it to them in as little as 24 hours or at most 3 days. That is our promise to
them. But even with an expanding economic landscape, delivering merchandise across
the country quickly and efficiently would mean navigating Nigeria’s physical
landscape - a traffic choked challenge across crumbling roads that companies
like amazon.com rarely if ever face.
In Nigeria we don't have a functioning postal
system in any real sense of the word. So Konga's greatest challenge has been to
create that from scratch. We have basically had to build up a fleet of motorbikes
and deliveryman, we have had to build up a system for getting goods anywhere in
Lagos within 24 hours and anywhere in Nigeria within 72 hours and less and
that's a huge challenge.
There are
other challenges - credit card usage is growing but risks associated with
online scams have kept Nigeria mainly an all cash society. Only 10 per cent of Konga's customers use credit
cards. For the others it's cash upon
delivery. Either way, buying online is catching on. And for Shagaya one
advantage of doing business in Nigeria is costs. You will find out that Nigeria
is an amazing economic environment to do business in.
The margins are generally
better than other parts of the world. The
cost of labor is generally cheaper than in other parts of the world. So you can
do interesting things that you really couldn't do in the west and Konga is not
alone. There are about 70 online
retailers in Nigeria selling everything from books, food & shoes to even
used cars. Shagya says he welcomes the
competition.
And Nigerians
likely do as well because it means competitive pricing-- and when it comes to
shopping, they, like everyone else, love a good deal.
The immediate sort of objective is to give the
Nigerian customer the best price the best convenience the best selection of goods
that anybody else can give them in Nigeria whether they are online or offline
doesn't matter. You go on Konga dotcom, you find this Panasonic blender, you
order it , we will call you to verify that order because in this part of the
world, people want that human contact, you need to build trust with people. So
immediately that order goes first to our customer care people who call you. And
as soon as they check that you indeed want this good, in a few minutes really,
there's somebody in the warehouse running around to pick that item for you.
Shagaya employs 70 people - up from 10, just
four months ago-- he says that comes from growing customer demand. But while
the company is expanding, he knows that his country still has challenges:
unemployment and grinding poverty remain major issues-- with more than 20
percent of the population jobless. That
number is even higher for young people-- driving crime and discontent.
We are under
no illusions that this was a one, two or three year journey. We knew that this
was going to be a very long road to build out this system that we think we owe Nigerians
to build out. Our desire is to allow
Nigerians to consume with dignity.
I am not saying that what we are doing here is
altruistic by any means, we're a business. But I think what we are also doing
is building our country. What we are doing is almost a patriotic duty.
It is that
kind of thinking Shagaya says, that has fueled the growth of great companies
and industries around the world. He is hoping to continue that trend in his
home country.
Brief About Sim Shagaya:
Sim
Shagaya is a serial technology and media entrepreneur who has worked for
Google, RealNetworks, Microstrategy. He holds degrees from George Washington U,
Dartmouth and Harvard. He is the founder of DealDey, a Groupon kind-of
group-buying site that offers its members in Lagos discounted deals on several
kinds of products and services.
Day by day DealDey sends emails to
members/customers about the latest discounts on consumables. When the required
amount of customers is attained, members automatically receive a coupon along
with details about their purchase’s collection.
With Nigeria’s internet market shaping up,
customers are hoping to make the most out of the benefits of online shopping.
... Making SENSE of digital revolution!
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