First modification: 18/04/2021 – 10:32
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Moscú (AFP)
Milk, eggs, toilet paper, in the center of Moscow some employees fill the shopping bags at full speed. The same is true in New York. With the pandemic, deliveries of supplies to homes by courier in 15 minutes are devastating.
This online service, launched in Moscow in 2019 under the name “Lavka”, by the Russian internet giant Yandex, has grown exponentially during the lockdown of spring 2020 and has since gained ground by encouraging others to follow in its footsteps in other parts of the world.
“Before the pandemic, we were … a fun device. After the pandemic, everything changed, especially in the beginning when people were scared,” says Maxime Avtukhov, 30, Lavka’s chief financial and commercial officer. .
The home delivery platforms of major supermarkets were overloaded. Some of the customers were reoriented towards the ultra-fast delivery by bicycle courier of less quantity of purchase, prepared in centers closed to the public. Thus they avoided waiting for days for their supplies. Since then, many Muscovites have maintained this habit.
“When you come home from work and wonder what to eat, you can ask for a prepared dish or order products and cook them,” enthuses Yuri Nekrasov, a 32-year-old lawyer.
His family already only goes to the supermarket once a week, or even every two weeks, because Lavka also delivers everything from drinks to canned food to fresh produce.
Mary Levocz, 34, an English teacher in Moscow, uses it for occasional purchases and for jugs of water, because the tap is not drinkable. It saves you from having to go up four floors in a building without an elevator.
“I started using it at the beginning of winter, it was snowing and I didn’t always feel like going out in the cold.” Since then he has been ordering several times a week.
Typical customers are rather young, connected, well off, and want to make selective purchases. In general, prices are higher than in supermarkets, but some basic products are cheap.
– “And why not in New York?” –
In the fourth quarter of 2020, the service generated more than 4 billion rubles (€ 44 million, $ 52 million), or 18% of all Yandex’s taxi and grocery delivery activities. They currently cover several major Russian cities, as well as Tel Aviv. The launch in Paris is scheduled for the second quarter of the year. London will follow.
At a Moscow warehouse, Kutman Kanatbek Uulu arrives wearing a yellow and black backpack. They ask you to deliver two orders.
“You can earn between 3,000 and 5,000 rubles a day (33-55 euros, 40-66 dollars)” with the condition of working as a freelancer, says the 18-year-old Kyrgyz.
On the other side of the planet, in the Park Slope neighborhood of Brooklyn, in New York, the same thing happens in the start-up Fridge No More (“No more refrigerator”).
A delivery man with a blue and white backpack leaves with a delivery for a customer two blocks away. Come back in a few minutes. Here the founders wanted all workers to be employees.
For the two founders, also Russian, the adventure began in 2019, when 40-year-old Anton Gladkoborodov was in New York and 38-year-old Pavel Danilov in Moscow.
“We knew that service was appreciated in Moscow, why not (would it be) in New York?” Recalls Danilov.
The pandemic also gave them wings. The company made more than $ 15 million (€ 12 million) that spring and plans to open dozens of sites in the next twelve months in New York.
According to analytics company PitchBook, more than $ 14 billion (€ 11.6 billion) has been invested in delivering groceries around the world since early 2020, mostly in 2021.
With covid-19, “the demand for food purchase delivery has skyrocketed,” notes Olivier Salomon, from the AlixPartners consulting firm.
“But it is not yet clear what will remain of the innovations that have emerged during the last 18 months. Which will prevail, the speed of delivery or the quantity? It is difficult to combine the two,” he says.
© 2021 AFP
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