Supporting Georgia’s growing e-commerce sector

E-commerce is becoming a growing trend in Georgia since Covid-19. According to a report titled “E-commerce in Georgia” by the Georgian investment bank Galt and Taggart, the e-commerce market grew from 11% in 2018 to 23% in 2020. The report predicted that by 2025, online shopping will grow at compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 52%, resulting in a penetration rate of 4.7%.
The report shows that the largest online shopping sector in 2020 was consumer electronics and home appliances, accounting for 65% of total sales. The second largest category was clothing and accessories.
Davit Phanjakidze, a student from Georgia, like many of his friends and acquaintances, regularly uses the services of shipping companies to buy products online. He says it’s worth buying things through platforms in different countries and paying the extra price for shipping here, primarily because of the variety it offers.
“In the past, people had to travel to find quality goods, and sometimes they went somewhere without knowing what the quality would be like,” Phanjakidze said. “It could be bad and they made this trip for a reason. Online shopping gives us choices. There are many options available on the website, but if you go in person there may only be two.”
Although the average in Georgia is still much lower than in European countries, according to Galt and Taggart’s report, e-commerce will continue to grow due to several factors: Users will be more willing to shop online, people will start spending more annually, and local online sellers will get more funding thanks to international spending.
To take advantage of this growing e-commerce trend, several shipping companies have emerged and regularly strive to introduce innovative new products to boost the sector’s growth.
Among them is the Georgian forwarding company USA2GEORGIA. Founded in 2008, USA2GEORGIA is part of the International Air Transport Association, which enables shipments to/from various countries around the world. Over the past few years, the company has added three major trading partners, including China, the United States and Turkey.
On May 28, the company announced the launch of a new brand, CARGO2GEORGIA, which will enable customers to receive full and group ocean shipments from China and the US, as well as road shipments from Turkey.
“CARGO2GEORGIA aims to optimize the international cargo transportation system by providing a wide range of services to small, medium and large enterprises,” the company wrote in its press release. “This includes transporting cargo from the company’s warehouses or off-site loading, as well as customs clearance in Georgia.”
According to the Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC), an online distribution platform based on geographic economic activity, Georgian imports in 2022 mainly came from Turkey, China and the United States, as well as Russia and Germany. These observations coincide with a statement from USA2GEORGIA, which explains that the number of products imported from the three largest countries continues to increase. Due to the constant increase in imports, CARGO2GEORGIA was created so that people could buy more products internationally, at competitive prices and with greater efficiency.
Under the name USA2GEORGIA there is LOCKER.GE, TURKEY2GEORGIA, CHINA2GEORIGA, and currently CARGO2GEORIGA. According to the brand’s website, currently the volume of cargo transported internationally is almost eight million pieces. In its new venture, the company hopes to leverage its experienced logistics team combined with international partners and technology to provide services quickly at a reasonable price.
“With the launch of CARGO2GEORGIA, USA2GEORGIA further expands its service offering by providing comprehensive logistics solutions for international cargo transportation,” it said in its press release. “These new services contribute to the growth and diversification of products available in the Georgian market, benefiting both businesses and individual consumers.”
Other Georgian companies, such as the German logistics company DHL, also deliver worldwide. Thanks to this service, products can be purchased and brought to any country using the customer’s chosen means of transport – road, air or ocean. Another service, KiwiPost, is also becoming increasingly popular in Georgia, delivering parcels to and from the US, UK, Turkey, China and Greece.
USA2GEORGIA originally opened its branches in Tbilisi, but has expanded to other areas of the country in recent months. Currently, there are 11 branches in Tbilisi, one in Batumi and one in Kutaisi. One thing the company is proud of is the development of self-service terminals, first introduced a decade ago, to reduce the time it takes to receive shipping orders. This is a feature that has since been taken up by others in the industry, including KiwiPost.
“Let us recall that the idea of ​​self-service terminals existed in the world only in 2015. It was developed by USA2GEORGIA and successfully implemented in our country. Thanks to this new feature, the collection of shipments has become even easier and faster,” the company boasts.