The 500% Leap From Store to Door
“WHAT WAS IN THAT FIRST order when we started, do you remember, Ari?” Lynton Peters, the CEO of OneCart, asks his co-founder and COO, Ariel Navarro.
“Probably water and bananas,” Navarro laughs.
“What are people buying now?” Peters asks.
“Everything!” Navarro laughs again.
When South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, declared the National State of Disaster on March 15 and followed it with a strict Level 5 lockdown on March 27, this prohibited large public gatherings, local and international travel, and schools and universities from continuing in-person classes.
The ides of March brought with it fear, frenzy and public panic as South Africans flocked to their local supermarkets to stock up on essentials such as toilet paper, soap, cleaning agents, non-perishables, disinfectants and sanitizers.
This is when OneCart went from serving about 150-250 shoppers a day to almost
