1Trolley: digitizing MENA's retail
1Trolley is bringing MENA's retailers into the digital age.
Biography:
Walid Rashwan is the founder of 1Trolley, a startup digitizing MENA’s retailers, including large F&B players such as Tim Hortons. Via 1Trolley, retailers can launch custom loyalty programs, integrate payment gateways and manage their supply-chain.
Walid sports over 2 decades of experience in the FMCG sector, with companies like Unilever and B.A.T, where he spent 13 years residing across 4 countries.
1Trolley went through a deep pivot. Can you explain it?
We started off in the UAE with a classic e-commerce play. We realized we were late to market, so we moved to Egypt to launch a B2C e-commerce model (we aggregated neighborhood stores on an app and enabled clients to buy digitally). Our cost of acquisition (CAC) was high and Egypt’s currency depreciation stung our margins. These two elements made it hard to raise.
We moved back to the GCC and pivoted to B2B, selling the tech we’d already build to larger clients. The lowest-hanging fruit for these companies was digitizing last-mile delivery. We managed to get our first couple of large accounts through that product. Once we were into those accounts, we launched other products to serve other needs.
RO insights: selling B2B in markets with currency depreciation
Selling B2B rather than B2C is an initial hedge against currency depreciation. Another hedge is selling that same B2B product outside of one’s home market, to gain precious stable currency revenue.
Here’s how Idil Azizoğlu and Basar Yenidunya, from 212 (a Turkish VC), explain it:
“Our motto is “test local, go global” but this approach can be debated. It’s great for founders to sell locally and cut their teeth, but the quicker they get revenue in $ or € the better. Many have to start in Turkey to sharpen their product, their pitch, get traction… Attacking Western markets with a brand new product and no experience is a tall order.
There isn’t a perfect way to deal with depreciation. Founders have to dynamically adjust their pricing to reflect the exchange rate. Depreciation’s most nefarious impact isn’t operational but psychological: it pushes companies to be cautious. This mentality, especially in a startup context, isn’t good.
While selling in Turkey, founders should weather the storm and be agile. After some time, depreciation becomes baked into one’s strategy. But the best cure is selling abroad. Even Turkish private equity firms, holding onto fragile Turkish SMEs, are now looking for companies with “natural FX hedge” (ie: foreign currency revenue).
The weaker the Lira gets, the more competitive Turkish companies selling in $ get, since each $ gets you more locally. It’s a strange logic, but it works.”
Excerpt from Why B2B makes sense in emerging markets, originally published in The Realistic Optimist
How is 1Trolley’s product segmented today?
3 main pillars.
The first is demand generation: we help clients build digital loyalty programs, which helps customer retention and increases customer lifetime value (LTV).
The second is check-out solutions: we help clients integrate payments gateways and offer in-app wallets (which can be connected to the loyalty program).
The third is delivery management: we help clients digitally manage their deliveries rather than clunky manual processes. This works for a client’s outbound and inbound deliveries.
The market for such tools has verticalized, meaning each pillar is served by a distinct company. This creates unnecessary complexity for clients, which we assuage by offering the full toolbox.
What other verticals do you want to launch?