Inventory management makes or breaks retail businesses. Sourcing inventory is already as complicated as it is critical, a process that’s made orders of magnitude more complex with a lack of transparency for product pricing and availability. Neighborhood stores in Pakistan are all too familiar with this pain. The fifth most populous country in the world relies on about two million neighborhood stores (accounting for 90% of all retail) to provide access to products, particularly in its densely populated cities. Having grown up in Lahore, I know how critical these businesses are to the communities they serve.
Brothers Ismail and Babar Khan watched their dad operate a CPG business in Lahore, a city of about 14 million people, for three decades with the same grievance — unexpected inventory costs and unreliable delivery stymied growth. They knew that product pricing transparency and a simplified way to interact with dozens of brands would help store owners focus on growing their businesses instead of hustling to sustain them. Their answer is Tajir.
Tajir is Pakistan’s largest tech-enabled retail network — a one stop shop for sellers to compare the prices of goods, purchase inventory, and enjoy the convenience of 24/7 ordering with next-day delivery. They’re already servicing thousands of neighborhood stores in Lahore and have been growing in large part from word of mouth from the goodwill they’ve built with the seller community.
We’re proud to make Kleiner Perkins’ first investment in Pakistan, and partner with Babar, Ismail, and the entire Tajir team as they transform how stores in Pakistan source inventory and grow.
ー Mamoon