Sky.Garden is a SaaS e-commerce platform built for retailers in Africa.

Note: Between now and the end of the year, we’re counting down the top twelve popular podcast interviews of 2018. It is a people’s choice award, determined by the number of downloads. This interview originally aired on March 12, 2018.

People who work in the informal economy make up half to three-quarters of the non-agricultural labor force in many countries. In Kenya, the informal sector represents 82.7% of all employment.

Many of the people involved in the informal economy also have a job in the formal economy. Isaac Hunja, the Chief Marketing Officer at Sky.Garden, comments, “Every Kenyan has a side-hustle.”

One example of the informal economy is street vendors. They may have a kiosk in a marketplace or they may be selling goods from the backseat of their car. According to Women in Informal Employment: Globalizing and Organizing (WIEGO):

• Most street vendors provide the main source of income for their households.
• Over half of street vendors surveyed said they source the goods they sell from formal enterprises.
• Street vendors create jobs, not only for themselves but also for porters, security guards, transport operators, storage providers, and others.
• Many generate revenue for cities through payments for licenses and permits, fees and fines, and certain kinds of taxes

Street vendors have a particular set of challenges. They may place a classified ad, offering their merchandise for sale. Customers call their mobile phone, with perhaps one in ten calls converting to a sale. Then the merchant must figure out how to deliver their merchandise and get paid. They may use a carrier. The carrier must deliver the merchandise, collect the payment and return the money to the merchant. The entire chain of events is fraught with problems.

Sky.Garden offers an alternative to this problematic process. Merchants can download the app and set up their online store in five minutes. They can take pictures with their phone and upload their inventory in less than 30 minutes. Each item in their shop has a unique URL. And their webshop has a unique URL. This allows the vendor to share links viaWhatsApp, text message, or social media.

When a sale is made, Sky. Garden takes the transaction from there. They call the vendor to confirm the item is still available. They call the customer to confirm delivery details and dispatch a courier to deliver the item. Once the item is delivered, payment is made via mobile money, mPESA. Sky.Garden manages customer care using a machine learning framework.  protects all parties involved, and builds trust in the platform.

Sky.Garden has over 3,000 unique web shops on their platform, featuring over 10,000 products. Sky.Garden employs field agents to acquire new merchants, help them upload their first inventory, and teach the merchants to use e-commerce. While they are working with the vendors, the field agents are also vetting the vendors to ensure that they are not selling knock-off items. There is also a daily clean-up process on the platform to ensure all merchandise meets Sky. Garden’s requirements.

SocialEntrepreneurship Quotes from Isaac Hunja

Social Entrepreneurship Resources:

• Sky.Garden: https://sky.garden
• Sky.GardenMerchant App: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=garden.sky.shop
• Sky.Garden onFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/www.sky.garden
• Sky.Garden onTwitter: https://twitter.com/wwwskygarden
• Sky.Garden on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wwwskygarden
• iHub: https://ihub.co.ke
• Book: Crazy Good Advice: 10 Lessons Learned from 150Leading Social Entrepreneurs: https://tonyloyd.com/book