Primecart’s bold attempt to dominate ecommerce in Nigeria through Shoprite

During the festive period, public holidays, and those notable days that are not recognised in Nigeria’s calendar, people often troop en masse to quite a number of places, with one of these being Shoprite. But not every Nigerian waits until the holidays to visit Shoprite – as a matter of fact, a sizeable proportion of the corporate demographic in Nigeria relies on Shoprite for their daily living.

“I spend more than 60% of my monthly earnings on Shoprite,” said Dayo, an Abuja-based Nigerian high-earning medical professional.

There are more people like Dayo whose daily lives revolve around Shoprite; from the food they eat in the morning to the flavored Durex condom brand they love to use – everything is purchased from Shoprite. It’s not always easy to obtain items from the retail chain. For example, take their largest outlet, which is located at a popular mall in Ibadan; shoppers could spend up to 30 minutes in long queues. This wasted time could be spent on doing more productive chores, attending meetings, or resting.

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The long queues at Shoprite don’t seem to be shortening anytime soon, thus creating an opportunity for a new startup in Nigeria. The opportunity is large enough that the founder of Primecart, Abiola Samuel, believes that by the end of 2016, the startup could become Nigeria’s third largest ecommerce platform behind Jumia and Konga. This is the goal for the fledgling self-funded company, which begins its pilot test deliveries in January.

“What we’re doing is simple and that’s putting Shoprite online. The fact that Shoprite is not online is a great ecommerce vacuum,” said Samuel.

He also clearly stated there is no official involvement from Shoprite with the platform.

“Primecart works by enabling Shoprite customers shop from the comfort of their homes without necessarily having to make the trip to Shoprite,” he said.

On the surface, the idea sounds similar to that of Raphael Afaedor’s Supermart, but there are differences. The obvious being the decision to sink-or-swim with Shoprite. Samuel, however, gave a reasonable justification for this decision. “Shoprite is the largest supermarket in Africa and we believe starting with them will give us some form of leverage. Our plan is to allow customers in all the African countries Shoprite operates to be able to order online. That means we plan to cover the African continent but we’re starting first with Lagos,” he told Ventureburn.

Read more: CEO of Supermart.ng Raphael Afaedor on the state of Nigeria’s ecommerce

Even with plans to expand the startup across Africa, for now, it will operate independently of the retail giant.

“I believe once they see the amount of revenue they are generating through us, they’ll want to come on board. Our target now is growth and to generate enough revenue that’ll attract Shoprite’s attention,” he added.

For the platform to run seamlessly, shoppers need to know what Shoprite has in store. In other words, Primecart needs to have access to the retail chain’s inventory listings. This is something the startup doesn’t yet have, which is why they are choosing to start with the fast moving consumer goods, such as groceries.

“We already have inventory for those ones. From there we will build our database gradually to include everything in Shoprite,” said Samuel.

But an average Shoprite shopper in Nigeria loves to be in the store, pushing carts from one point to another and picking groceries, comparing brands and taking selfies. These are features that they may not be able to enjoy if they choose to buy from Primecart instead. The founder agreed to this and said they are not targeting every customer that visits Shoprite. He revealed Primecart is only targeting 10% of people that value their time and don’t want to go through stress to shop from their favorite store.

Read more: Konga’s bold attempt to revolutionise online payments in Nigeria

“Our target market is not for all Shoprite shoppers. Shoprite has well over 200 000 weekly customers, all of whom must journey to the store, drive through traffic and stand on a long queue before they make a purchase. Then they drive back home,” elaborated Samuel. He went on to add, “10% of the 200 000 weekly customers is our target market.”

Uber-powered Swift delivery

Orders would be delivered withing one hour using Uber as a courier. Other forms of delivery will be available based on the customer’s preferred turnaround time.

“We deliver within [one hour] via Uber. In case of traffic delivery times could be delayed. Our [three hour], same day and next day deliveries will be handled via MAX,” Samuel said.

Billing

Unlike the billing system used by Konga and Jumia, which uses a fixed pricing model for shipping, Primecart will be utilising an ‘automated’ billing system for more transparent pricing.

He also revealed the platform does not offer cash on delivery service because of its numerous issues. “Customer is buying directly from Shoprite and as such there is no possibility that a customer will refuse what has already been bought. What will happen if a customer orders a perishable product and for some strange reason he/she decides not to pay or show up to receive package?”

Read more: 5 lessons on Nigeria’s ecommerce space from HouseholdMax

According to Samuel, cash on delivery has a lot of issues which is why more startups are choosing not to offer the option to their customers. Supermart is following suit with this trend.

“Shopping on Primecart equals to shopping direct from Shoprite so customers will have the same confidence and trust,” Samuel added.

The startup is gearing up to begin the pilot test delivery phase. Deliveries will begin in January and Samuel hopes to launch by February. He said he expects 10% of Shoprite customers to order their weekly groceries from Primecart instead of going through the stress of going to the store. Obtaining just 5% of the retail chain’s weekly customers will make them the third largest ecommerce company in Nigeria.

The last question for Samuel was an obvious one. Ventureburn asked whether he can sell Primecart to Shoprite. His answer was also quite predictable. “We’ve not thought about that,” he concluded.