After raising a Series C ~€87 million round, Everli, the Milan-based marketplace for online grocery shopping, plans to expand into the Romanian and German markets at the beginning of 2022. The new entry ads to an already competitive market for online grocery shopping and delivery in Romania.
A model based on same-day grocery shopping
Everli was founded in Verona, Italy, in 2014, with the mission to make grocery shopping simple and fast. The company is now headquartered in Milan, with offices in Verona and Warsaw, employing more than 250 people and offering flexible employment to over 3000 “Shoppers”.
With Everli, customers can order products from their favorite supermarkets and receive products within a one-hour window. All with help from dedicated Everli Shoppers, who take orders, make the purchases in the stores indicated in the app, and deliver them to the client. They can choose the times to work and are paid on a weekly basis.
The company currently operates in more than 80 cities across Italy, Czech Republic, Poland, and France, across which it partners with grocery stores such as Carrefour, Lidl, and Kaufland. This allows the company to offer access to more than 300K products.
In Romania and Germany, Everli aims to seize the opportunity in offering customers online, same-day grocery shopping services, the CEO Federico Sargenti announced. The company will aim for a one-hour delivery, regardless of the type of groceries – fresh or packaged, and geographies, from city centers to low density areas.
With the move, new offices will also be set up in both Bucharest and Berlin. The company will open both local and fully remote positions across operations – accounting, sales, and marketing, as well as flexible job opportunities for Everli shoppers.
Leveraging higher demand for fast-delivery from online grocery retailers
In Romania, especially in large cities, more and more online grocery retailers are trying to meet customers’ demand for fast delivery times, often in partnership with delivery companies.
French retailer Auchan, for instance, partnered with Spanish delivery app-owner Lola Market (Ed.note recently acquired by Glovo) to deliver 14K products within a one-hour range in Bucharest. Tazz by eMAG, the eCommerce platform’s delivery service, formerly EuCeMananc, also offers 60-min delivery for both food and non-groceries. Moreover, the Carrefour-Bringo partnership experimented with a 30-minutes delivery service and recently expanded it to 25 stores in Bucharest and Iasi.
Additionally, Glovo reccently opened 11 new fulfillment centers in Romania to extend its fast delivery services. Glovo is a major multi-category delivery partner for retailers across CEE. Launched in Barcelona in 2015, the company recently strengthened its footprint in CEE through a series of acquisitions from Delivery Hero. For instance, in Romania and Bulgaria, Glovo acquired foodpanda – a delivery service working mainly with restaurants, but also retailers.
Elsewhere in the Czech Republic, the local grocery delivery startup Rohlik reached a unicorn status earlier this year, after a €100M Series C investment round. The company was founded in 2014 and aims to work as a virtual supermarket, delivering more than 17K items in less than two hours. Its retailer partners include wholesale players, large supermarkets, but also small food merchants. Rohlick, which also owns ~8% in equity in Bulgaria’s biggest online grocery supermarket, eBag, aims to expand its services to Romania in the future.
