Kuwait and Ukraine: The rise and development of the e-commerce market

With the rapid evolution of global e-commerce, Kuwait’s beauty e-commerce platform Boutiqaat and Ukraine’s e-commerce market have demonstrated the business potential and challenges in the region in their own unique ways.

Boutiqaat: the pioneer of social e-commerce

Boutiqaat was founded in 2018 and is located in Kuwait. The founder, Abdulwahab, successfully created this social media-driven beauty e-commerce platform with the help of “Internet celebrity” resources. The original intention of creating Boutiqaat originated from a less successful publicity attempt. Later, he discovered that the local channels for purchasing beauty products were extremely limited, which directly inspired the birth of Boutiqaat. The platform mainly promotes its products by contracting with “influencers” on social channels such as YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and Twitter. In particular, the number of fans on Instagram has exceeded one million, bringing tens of millions of YouTube video views.

Boutiqaat is committed to building a new type of consumer experience where users can purchase related beauty products by following their favorite “influencers”. This model not only promotes the sales of beauty products, but also allows social e-commerce to gradually occupy a place in the local market.

Ukraine: Potential of Eastern European e-commerce market

In sharp contrast to Boutiqaat’s rapid growth, Ukraine’s e-commerce market has shown rapid growth in Eastern Europe. According to data from the EU regulatory advisory body, Ukraine has become the fastest growing country in Europe’s e-commerce industry with a year-on-year growth rate of 31%. With the advantage of global technical talents, Ukraine’s IT service exports have also increased significantly, and this field is expected to continue to flourish in the next few years.

Although Ukraine’s e-commerce market is relatively less mature, its growth rate and market potential cannot be ignored. E-commerce companies such as Rozetka.ua are facing warehousing and infrastructure problems as they continue to expand. The co-founder of Rozetka pointed out that the rapid development of e-commerce has caused its warehouse to be almost full, which also reflects that the Ukrainian e-commerce environment is undergoing an important transformation.

Overview

The rise of Boutiqaat and the Ukrainian e-commerce market has undoubtedly brought new changes and challenges to the local business environment. Both fully embody the trend of combining social media with traditional e-commerce models, and how to find their respective footholds in a rapidly developing market.