South African Retail Company, SnapnSave May Soon Set up in Nigeria

Another South African (SA) business may soon greet the shores of Nigeria. Following a 14 Million Rands investment by two SA companies – Kalon Ventures Partners, a venture capital company and Smollan Group- SnapnSave, a retail solutions company has indicated its intention to explore the Nigerian market.

SnapnSave is a shopping community in SA which helps buyers save money directly into their accounts by simply snapping a photo of their till slip. Since its two-year existence, it has saved shoppers over R3.5-million, says its CEO, Mark Bradshaw.

The SnapnSave app is about to reach 200,000 installs mark. With this funding of R7-million each from both companies, it is expected that with a 12-month plan put in place, the installation can grow to 500,000 in South Africa.

Ventureburn reported that the funding is also expected to bring the startup into Nigeria and other Asian and African countries – Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam, Kenya and a North African country. These countries were said to be chosen as a destination for SnapnSave due to their existing use of coupons and the mobile phone penetration into the country.

We may not be able to vouch for the use of coupons in Nigeria, but we can sure vouch for the mobile phone penetration and mobile phone payment, a model which suits the telecommunications structure dominate by SA related companies like MTN and Vodacom.

According to Bradshaw, digital coupons are being used by about a 15% of the smartphone users in SA, a number which is already predictable to be doubled if the opportunity arrives in Nigeria, as Nigerians love the idea of saving money effortlessly, especially with the present economic state of the country and the uncertainty of improvement.

SnapnSave plans to grow the business using Smollan’s network as leverage. Smollan is present in over 50 countries, and provides services to over 500,000 retailers.

If SnapnSave makes it to Nigeria, a few Nigerians may grumble about yet another South African company being set up in Nigeria, but many others will be happy to save a few Nairas, conveniently forgetting whatever misgiving they might have towards SA companies.

In our opinion, this could be a great development; it could bring in more job opportunities in Nigeria, save some money for the citizens, and improve its conversance with the digitized world.