Nigerian startup Feegor is a B2B wholesale marketplace optimising product-sourcing end-to-end for SMEs across Africa, with Nigeria as its initial focus.
Founded last year, Feegor enables retail businesses to discover, negotiate, and source goods directly from a vast network of manufacturers, wholesalers, and major suppliers nationwide.
“Our focus is on the small to medium scale manufacturers and the major suppliers across local market regions,” Lucy Mbuthia, co-founder and COO of Feegor, told Disrupt Africa.
“We do not buy, warehouse or sell any product directly, but instead solve the discovery problem by giving online visibility to suppliers and manufacturers so SMEs can discover them on-demand, negotiate with them, and source goods directly from them through the Feegor app.”
Nigeria’s retail market is vast, worth US$105 billion, but Mbuthia says it is fragmented and underserved.
“Within its immense landscape, there are unmet needs and pressing challenges for over 17 million SMEs that need to source and restock goods frequently, but there is no easy, efficient, and on-demand way for them to do this,” she said.
“In Nigeria, SMEs face a notable challenge in efficiently sourcing goods due to the absence of a centralised platform, comparable to Alibaba. Unlike businesses seeking manufacturers or suppliers in China, which commonly turn to Alibaba, Nigerian SMEs must navigate a fragmented landscape. The absence of a singular, streamlined solution complicates the process of sourcing locally manufactured goods, imported items, or raw materials.”
Feegor wants to be that platform, and has seen decent uptake since it began commercial operations last September. Around 2,500 businesses are now on Feegor, with about 6,000 product SKUs now being sold on its wholesale marketplace by small-medium manufacturers and large suppliers. Over 3,000 B2B transactions have been carried out on marketplace.
Mbuthia said the majority of Feegor’s competitors are large, tech-enabled, and asset-heavy distributors of FMCGs.
“They buy from large FMCG manufacturers, usually multinationals, warehouse the products, and distribute to mom and pop shops, and even then they are only able to supply only three per cent of the FMCG products sold at these shops, as the majority of products sold at these shops are imported or manufactured by mid-small scale manufacturers,” she said. “Our competitors are also not able to support retail businesses who need to source for locally sourced, imported, or locally manufactured non-FMCG goods.”
Feegor raised a “friends and family” round of funding last year that enabled it to build its team and product, and kickstart commercial operations. It is currently raising a pre-seed round of US$500,000. Mbuthia said the startup, which monetises via commissions, subscriptions and online ads, was currently only operating in Nigeria, but does have expansion plans in the near future.
“Last year was a challenging year for fundraising, and to build and scale Feegor we need to raise funds from VCs. We are, however, optimistic as we have started getting some commitments from VCs,” she said.
