Four former senior managers at Paystack are leaving the payment company to launch GoLemon, a startup that delivers groceries and household items. Yinka Adewuyi, Gbadegbo Gbade-Oyelakin, Abdulrahman Jogbojogbo and Abiola Showemimo, all early employees, were at Paystack for at least six years.
Adewuyi, a former product lead at Paystack, is GoLemon’s CEO, while Gbade-Oyelakin, who led Paystack’s core platforms team, is the CTO. Jogbojogbo, a marketing lead at Paystack, will lead the startup’s growth, while Showemimo, one of the first ten employees at Paystack, will lead operations.
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The startup delivers groceries and household items to homes and businesses and will compete with other deep-pocketed companies like Glovo and Chowdeck, a YC-backed company. Competitors like Mano and Pricepally are also popular choices for grocery delivery in Lagos.
GoLemon’s entry into the market comes months after international giants like Jumia and Bolt exited the food and grocery delivery segment last year.
Francis Dufay, Jumia’s CEO, blamed challenging unit economics, big losses (Jumia Food never turned a profit in any of the 11 countries it operated in), and increasing competition for the decision to shut down Jumia Food.
And while some big players are beating a retreat, Jogbojogbo believes this is the best time to start a grocery delivery business.
“It’s difficult to get started right now and get traction but if we can weather the storm right now, I think we would have been able to build a formidable business,” Jogbojogbo told TechCabal on a call.
He added that the team will rely on Showemimo’s experience as a supermarket owner in Lagos and Gbade-Oyelakin’s experience as head of engineering at Supermart, an online supermarket, to build the business.
GoLemon’s unique proposition
GoLemon manages its inventory and fulfillment centres, directly sourcing its bulk products from farmers and FMCGs. Jogbojogbo told TechCabal that while GoLemon might have competition in aspects of its product offerings, it does not have an “end-to-end competitor.”
The startup has built a sourcing network connected directly to farmers and manufacturers and optimises for the lowest costs possible to attract a wide customer base. The startup mostly caters to large orders and was “intentionally designed around people who make repeat orders, repeat purchases and large basket size orders,” Jogbojogbo said.
The launch comes weeks after a former Flutterwave vice-president launched Mira, a foodtech startup. YC has also increasingly backed foodtech startups, even as it scales back its presence on the continent.
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