Meet Delivery Chacha - A service loved by Karachi-ites

With easy access to internet, e-commerce in Pakistan no longer remains an unusual notion. Be it online shopping or food portals, the masses are now rapidly embracing online businesses for their daily needs. This progress has brought unparalleled business opportunities for local delivery ventures. Over 5000 food orders are processed daily in Karachi, multiply it by the number of major cities and you will get a rough figure of the massive potential that is yet to be explored. While renowned names such as TCS and Blue Ex, occupy a huge share of the delivery market; but there is a huge untapped market for delivery startups which a few new entrants have explored by adding nominal prices and other value-added features in their service. Delivery startups are now being acquired by big corporations for the potential they hold. Forrun and Stallion Deliveries are such local delivery startups which were acquired by Arpatech and ARY Group respectively.

What is Delivery Chacha?

Delivery Chacha is a local on-demand delivery service that has grabbed an unusual space in the delivery market. Apart from the standard food and package delivery, the service promises to deliver and pick anything you want from anywhere in Karachi. This is where Delivery Chacha comes into play. While Delivery Chacha can pay your utility bills, get your medical reports and documents, deliver cakes at 12 am for your friends’ birthdays and also provide home based entrepreneurs with a delivery service.

A year back from now, a friend of Nashit (Founder of Delivery Chacha) was getting engaged. During the preparations, he observed the bride’s mom constantly on the phone, requesting her family members to pick different stuff for the event. Nashit suddenly had a light bulb moment. It clicked him that there should be a delivery service that can enable people to deliver everyday things without any hassle and wastage of resources. Being a business student at LUMS, he took the idea to his professors and mentor, made the feasibility study and Delivery Chacha was born.

What makes Delivery Chacha different?

There are a lot of Cash on Delivery (CoD) services currently operating in the city but most of them provide next day delivery. Delivery Chacha doesn’t only offer same day delivery but also the time frame is usually around 60 – 90 minutes. As an added value, at times they pay on behalf of their customers and pick their belongings. Later, they collect their cash, once the package is delivered. For instance, they have bought birthday cakes, paid to tailors, done groceries and the list goes on.

“With our service, you can have access to anything in Karachi under ninety minutes. This is not the only competitive edge that Delivery Chacha has, what they are really proud of is customization. For instance, a guy is ordering a burger but after a while he calls again to add some Peshawari ice cream to the order. The burger joint and the ice cream parlor might be at two different places but Delivery Chacha makes sure that their clients get what they want.” This is how Delivery Chacha has captured a huge chunk of food delivery market by delivering around 1000 orders per day. There are a lot of restaurants in Karachi that do not deliver to far flung areas, but here Delivery Chacha comes to the rescue and delivers at door step.

When asked about the perky name of the venture. Nashit said, “Chacha, Lala, Bhai Sahab are the humble names through which we show our respect towards chowkidars, rickshaw walay and dukaan walay. As I was at my friend’s engagement, the bride’s mom was also calling the domestic worker as chacha. Therefore, it hit him like a thunder bolt that these are the people who are an integral part of our lives and help make it easy.” Therefore, Delivery Chacha was coined as a way to connect with the masses.

Search for Riders

In the initial phases of the venture, Nashit was a one man show. He was taking orders, dispatching them, recording complaints and what not. He made sure no order goes rejected, however, being honest and upfront with his customers about the time for delivery. Soon he realized he needs smart riders who know the ins and outs of Karachi. With this, his difficult yet fruitful search began. He interviewed a lot of riders and soon realized that with the social class they usually hail from, they know about the best biryani and haleem places in town but not the high end eateries. He sketched out a training plan and started looking for riders who can talk to customers.

The crux of this riders’ search was the mere fact that what Delivery Chacha was trying to do in Karachi, had never been done anywhere. It was a new thing not only for the venture but also the riders and the localities.

Expansion Plans

Delivery Chaha is now aiming at integrating technology solutions with their business. Right now, they are not looking for any expansion in terms of riders. Therefore, they are working on business solutions to make their service more optimized. This includes a website under construction which will act as a portal to take online orders and display information such as order placement, confirmation, tracking and expected delivery time. Further expansion plans include taking Delivery Chacha to other cities such as Lahore and Islamabad.

Delivery Chacha is a story with many lessons for young and budding entrepreneurs of Pakistan. An innovative business plan does not necessarily need to have sophisticated engineering and a lot of investment. What matters is that your venture simplifies problem-solving for the masses and connect with them. Only then, a startup can emerge successful amongst the veterans of industry just like Delivery Chacha did.