Social commerce startup Kapu, by ex-Jumia executive, comes out of stealth with $8M funding

Kapu, a social commerce startup coming out of stealth today having raised $8 million in seed funding, is hoping to help alleviate the burden of buying food for consumers who are struggling with sky-rocketing food prices.

Sam Chappatte, the founder of Kapu, said that the startup has been building a B2C e- commerce service that enables consumers to buy groceries at lower prices.

Consumers will now be able to place orders with local agents. Soon, it will be able to support orders on the messaging service. Kapu enables group bulk buying of groceries and claims to help consumers save up to 30% on fresh produce and packaged goods.

The reason we started Kapu is that we think that there is a more relevant model of e- commerce that can be built to target the grocery If we can use technology to bring efficiency then we can have a huge impact on society.

The seed round was co-led by Giant and Firstminute Capital. They joined Kapu's early backers, which included India's Meesho and Brazil's Facily co-founders.

Sam Endacott, partner at Firstminute capital, said in a statement: "We are thrilled to partner with him and the entire Kapu team to help alleviate the cost of living crisis on the Continent for consumers."

In its next phase of growth, Kapu will work to fully penetrate the capital of the country before branching out to new markets.

Kapu's agents take customers' orders and make deliveries the next day.

Customers are notified by Kapu and the agents that they need to pick up their goods. Chappate said that many agents deliver to consumers.

Kapu said the offline channel and online direct to consumer models are designed for the Kenyan market, where e- commerce has not taken off but social commerce is.

According to the 2020 Social Media User Trends Report, the popularity of the social commerce sector in the region is increasing as a result of the Covid epidemic.

Tushop, which launched last year, is one of the new startups that are disrupting the informal retail sector. Group buying of food supplies is being enabled by Kapu and Tushop.

Social commerce platform Tushop set for Kenya growth after raising $3 million pre-seed funding