Here’s how JOKR became gross-profit positive amid a cutthroat grocery delivery industry
JOKR founder and CEO Ralf Wenzel
The instant grocery delivery game is not for the faint of heart. We noted earlier this year that grocery delivery is a tough business to be in, given the competitiveness of the market and later-stage funding drying up for cash-intensive sectors like this one.
Even the giants in the industry aren’t immune. We saw Instacart lower its valuation to be closer to what was happening over at DoorDash in the public markets, where its share price has also gotten hammered over the last six months.
Delivery company JOKR was also not immune to some skepticism in its early months. Last October, The Information reported that the company, founded earlier this year, “lost $13.6 million on $1.7 million of revenue, as of the end of July. It spent $2.3 million just on purchasing and delivering goods.”
However, the company went on to raise $260 million in December to become a billion-dollar company, and despite some growing pains, it seems like it has some believers and a business model that is working, at least for now. It has a new AI-powered app that taps into a customer’s past shopping behaviors to provide product personalization and a new partnership with the decarbonization platform Plan A, with the goal of becoming the “first climate-positive instant-delivery grocer.”
I spoke to Ralf Wenzel, JOKR’s founder and CEO, about, according to him, why his company’s model is doing better than most. The chat with Wenzel was edited for length and clarity.
