TEHRAN, Iran, April 3
Trend:
Iran's biggest e-commerce startup - Digikala, has faced challenges by rise of online shopping demands due to the coronavirus spread, Managing Director of the start-up Saeed Mohammadi told Trend.
"We have faced various challenges because of the coronavirus," he said.
"It's our responsibility to stand beside people in these days, online shopping was previously a choice but today it’s a necessity and an important factor in reducing unnecessary transportations," he added.
"The volume of online orders has suddenly increased," he said. "Online orders have increased in various categories for example demands for food items and fast moving consumer goods have increased by 300 percent but in other groups there was a 50 percent rise."
"Digikala's distribution centers are saturated by the growing number of orders and during this time we have understood that we are not able to process the increased demands," he added.
"The human sources during rise of online orders was also an issue, and maintaining health of our staff was also important that needed our attention, so we reduced the working shifts," he said.
"The company's strategy to reduce work force for preventing the coronavirus infection spread was implemented by increasing remote work, so that less people would be in dense space and processing centers," said Mohammadi.
"Therefore, some 5,000 of our employees are working remotely, which include 1,000 administrative and commercial staff members," he said.
"The medical conditions of our employees are checked daily, and individuals with symptoms of illnesses aren't allowed to work. We're also implementing protocols to disinfect our workplaces," he added.
"Some of our co-workers were tested coronavirus-positive, these individuals and their families that are being supported by us," he said.
"The workplace and cargo transporting vehicles are constantly being disinfected that reduces the capacity of the establishment, these issues have reduced our capacity by 30 percent while the orders have increased," he added.
"We have issued advertisement for new hiring that was the largest employment opportunity in the country for 2,000 jobs," he said.
"Some 400 individuals are interviewed per day, and so far 700 people were hired and the employing process is ongoing," he said.
"Increasing capacities in e-commerce sector is not possible overnight, and we need processing, warehouse and training centers therefore even the biggest platforms in the world, including Amazon, are limited to distributing medical items," he said.
"Fortunately we have not reached the point of cutting part of our services. We only accept specific volume of orders per day and have capacity to register 300,000 orders," he added.
"The government had good cooperation with Digikala in terms of transportation. The Interior Ministry has issued necessary permits for Digikala 's transformation fleet and lifted quarantine limits for transportation of commodities," he said.
"We are currently in negotiation with the government to obtain more support," he added.