The CEO of Supermart.ng, Raphael Afaedor has urged entrepreneurs in Nigeria to see the many problems in Nigeria as opportunities for them to solve financially rewarding problems.
Afaedor who made this statement while speaking during a panel session at the recent 2015 SME conference organized by the Lagos Business School said that what every entrepreneurs need is innovations that can solve societal problems and in return, the society rewards them financially.
Using his business as a typical case study, Afaedor explained that before setting up Supermart.ng, he had observed that a typical woman in Lagos has to go from one grocery store to another because she will likely not get everything she want in just one store. He went further to say that the woman will still have to go to local market to shop for local ingredients, all in the midst of the unpredictable Lagos Traffic. This according to him makes shopping quite discouraging, tedious and time consuming.
Afaedor went further to say that it was in a bid to solve this problem that he left Jumia in 2014 to start Supermart.ng. According to him “Today, Supermart.ng has partnered with leading supermarkets and local markets to put up a one stop shop online with over 60,000 items including Fresh food, foreign products, Nigerian ingredients, general groceries and baby products among others. Within ten to fifteen minutes, an average customer is done with her shopping on Supermart.ng and the items will be delivered to them in as early as three hours, this saves them about three to six hours of their time which they can invest in more profitable things like resting, reading or enjoying leisure with their spouses or children”.
He noted that in building the business, there were many discouragements and challenges notably among which was the logistics of delivering the products within promised time owing to the traffic situation in Lagos. “However, because we set our mind on solving the problem, we were able to find our way around it. There will always be a solution if you are determined as an entrepreneur to really create value and solve problems” he added.