Business operators have spoken about the way they were forced to reinvent themselves and shift operations online to survive as the pandemic dramatically shifted consumer habits.
Nearly a year since COVID-19 hit Malta, the “absolute majority” of businesses have invested to shift online and offer delivery services, according to Malta Chamber of SMEs chief executive Abigail Mamo.
While a level of eCommerce was in place, no business was really geared up to be able to cater for the full amount of customers to migrate online.
The majority of businesses have also added delivery services to serve a growing number of customers who resorted to shopping online.
“The absolute majority of businesses carried out these improvements and they aim to continue investing,” said Mamo.
Many businesses were forced to close down for weeks as part of restrictive measures that included the closure of all shops, except for non-essentials.
As people opted to stay indoors and resort to deliveries for fear of contracting the virus, businesses had to face the option – adapt or die. According to Mamo, the majority chose to fight – becoming more competitive on the digital front.
“We can now compete 100 per cent with foreign online competitors since the prices compare very well and the waiting time is close to non-existent with, many times, next day delivery. In addition to this, consumers have the comfort and confidence that they are shopping from local businesses so they do not need to worry about return costs, changing of products and other guarantee issues in case of issues with the product,” she said.
‘We had to refocus our business’
Sebastian Ripard, chief executive at TXF Tech – partners for Bolt in Malta, Cyprus and Tunisia, spoke about the way the company had to change its focus during the pandemic.
Bolt Food, a food delivery platform, was set up in January 2020, just before the pandemic hit. Before that, the company was only involved in the cab business.
“The impact of COVID devastated the cab business. Within a week our business was down by 90 per cent – it was very painful. However, at the same time, we saw a heavy growth in the food delivery business. It was a tough three months to reallocate resources.
“We had to refocus our business to remain alive. The requests from restaurants increased and we had to increase our sales team eventually expanding from delivering food for restaurants, to groceries,” he said.
“We became a player and allowed people in this unprecedented atmosphere to continue operating… We started to serve a purpose – allowing restaurants to reach their clients and offering employment, as couriers increased by five times. We now have about 500 couriers.”
New opportunities
Stefan Debattista used the pandemic to set up a new businesses based on the very need of businesses to have a digital presence.
He set up Shows Happening with co-founder Mark Farrugia eight years ago to sell tickets to events. Over the years the business grew with them expanding to large events. But then COVID hit and all events stopped.
“When COVID happened we started having a few requests from clients looking to put things online. We started working on setting up a platform for retail and shops – ShopShape,” he said, adding that retailers were realising that investing in online presence was more essential than having an outlet in a prime location.
The platform already started on-boarding the first clients who pay a monthly subscription. “We aim to help shops in this climate and offer the platform where to sell online and reach their customers and keep up with the times.”
Josef Borg, owner of Beer Head.‘It became about survival, not growth’
Josef Borg, owner of Beerhead, had a similar experience. The shop opened at the beginning of 2020 with the aim of introducing the craft beer scene.
“In March we were caught by surprise as we had planned our business around tasting events to promote and introduce craft beer. We had an educational mission that was all tied to tasting and physical presence was key. This all had to change,” he said.
All outlets, except for non-essentials, were forced to close. When, after a few months Beerhead reopened they initially did not allow people in the shop – turning into a pick-up shop with reduced opening hours.
“We reinvested to reinvent ourselves to go online and used our own cars to deliver initially. These were the decisions we had to take to survive. We had just opened so surviving was the natural option. But it was no longer about growing our business. It became about surviving,” he said, adding that the company eventually partnered with a delivery agent to handle that side.
Now the shop is open, allowing a restricted amount of people in, but beer tasting is not happening yet. Instead they turned to social media as their educational tool until the time comes to go back to the original plan.