Afrigather Sky.Backyard, a Kenyan e-commerce platform for electronics and residential merchandise comparable to furnishings, eliminated 1,500 of its 30,000 distributors in a “clear up” of counterfeit items. The corporate dismissed claims that some distributors have been boycotting the platform.
“Now we have not noticed any boycotts from distributors. Nevertheless, we lately carried out an intensive cleanup of {the marketplace}. This course of concerned eradicating brokers and sellers of counterfeit or substandard items,” Sky.Backyard informed TechCabal in an announcement.
The e-commerce platform has additionally eliminated brokers who falsely claimed to be sellers. Brokers assist distributors promote their merchandise on marketplaces, however they don’t personal any merchandise.
Sky.Backyard’s crackdown on counterfeit items conflicts with claims by at the least three distributors that they have been unfairly faraway from the platform. A number of different distributors stopped posting their merchandise on Sky.Backyard’s e-commerce website, these folks claimed.
A minimum of 5 prospects additionally informed TechCabal that their digital orders from Sky.Backyard have been by no means delivered and the corporate promised refunds.
“We have been informed to attend for as much as 24 hours to obtain a refund,” stated one buyer who waited three weeks for the refund.
Sky.Backyard stated some refunds have been delayed due to problems with choose retailers. “Nevertheless, we’ve got since resolved these points, and all excellent refunds have been processed,” the corporate stated.
Sky.Backyard claims it has a 75% success price and a median fee of 8%. Success price is the share of buyer orders which are efficiently processed and delivered on time.
In 2022, Sky.Backyard was acquired by buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) agency Lipa Later for KES 250 million ($1.93 million). The acquisition was a lifeline for the struggling firm which introduced layoffs of over 50 workers. A few of these workers have been retained after the acquisition.
“The transition over the previous 12 months has been a steady studying expertise, and we’re pleased with the progress we’ve made. Our major focus stays to place Sky.Backyard as Kenya’s main market,” Juliet Wanjiru, Sky.Backyard’s managing director informed TechCabal.
As sister corporations, Sky Backyard prospects use Lipa Later’s BNPL providers to unfold out funds for on-line purchases.
