Contxto – Thanks to the coronavirus pandemic, many households in Mexico bought their groceries online for the first time. An odd experience for some, a neat one for others, and if you’re Mexican Justo, it’s primetime for raising funds and scaling.
Last Thursday (1) news broke that the online grocery delivery startup closed an additional investment for US$5 million.
Bimbo Ventures and Sweet Capital pitched the funds. The former being the CVC arm of Bimbo, a multinational bakery company, while the latter belongs to the founders of king.com, the same company that made Candy Crush.
Justo grocery delivery in Mexico and beyond
Covid-19 has given Jüsto a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to grow.
The startup raised a US$12 million bridge round in July, scaled outside of Mexico City and launched into the city of Querétaro in mid August. And the e-grocer reports that sales in this market were astounding.
Jüsto told TechCrunch that what they sold in a week in Querétaro had taken 200 days to achieve in Mexico City.
It’s also launching into Colombia and Peru. Moreover, Ecuador may be next in 2021.
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Scale like you mean it
This year showed cynicism towards some startups that scaled too quickly only to withdraw later.
Nonetheless, if you’re among the industries to have been favored by the Covid-19 outbreak, by all means, scale dammit. Especially since Latin America is crawling into the new normal.
With some lockdown measures still in place and winter a few months away, the window of e-commerce opportunities is still open. The flu season will likely lead to more Covid-related chaos and people preferring to stay home.
Therefore, expanding before all that solidifies means connecting with consumers who are still practicing social isolation.
Beyond the new normal and scaling, the next big challenge for startups like Jüsto who work in the e-grocery business, will be keeping users ordering online once it’s safer to personally go shopping again.
But that’ll still be awhile.
Related articles: Tech and startups from Mexico!
-ML
