The Untold Truths About Buying Groceries Online in Abuja

It’s hard to imagine that there was once a time in Abuja when online grocery shopping didn’t exist. Grocery shopping on its own is a long and tedious process. I honestly am not even sure how I ever lived without the possibility of the convenience of online grocery shopping.

There are so many reasons to get on board the online grocery shopping wagon, but let me just use this opportunity to tell you about a gentleman called Dahiru and lady called Biliki.

 

Dahiru

One fateful Saturday afternoon, Dahiru had a lot of pending office work to do but he also needed to stuck up on groceries for the coming week. He decided to dress up (15 minutes), enter his car (2 minutes), turn on the AC (5 seconds), and brave the traffic to a supermarket (40 minutes).

In the supermarket, he walked from aisle to aisle looking for the items on his grocery list (30 minutes). After walking all over the place for 30 minutes, our guy Dahiru was disappointed to find that the toilet paper, cookies and pancake mix shelves were empty. Carrying a heavy ‘incomplete’ basket, he had to queue at the till to pay for the things he had bought (20 minutes + leg pain + back pain), and waited for the assistant to pack up his items (5 minutes). He carried his heavy grocery bags back to his car (4 minutes + more back pain), braved the traffic a second time as he drove to another supermarket in search of toilet paper, cookies and pancake mix (35 minutes + stress).

Dahiru had to waka about a second supermarket and this time he found the toilet rolls, cookies, and some other items he didn’t plan to buy but did anyway, but still no pancake mix! (25 minutes + impulse spending). Ahhhh Dahiru don suffer fa! He was not happy about this at all. So he queued again to pay, waited for the assistant to pack his items and braved the traffic for the third time as he drove back home (50 minutes).

By the time Dahiru got home, he was exhausted and could hardly be productive with any of that work he needed to have done earlier. As if that wasn’t bad enough, he craved pancakes for dinner! Oh gosh! But since he didn’t find any pancake mix in both of the supermarkets he went to, he had to eat Indomie for the 5th time that week.

 

Biliki

Now let me tell you about Biliki- on the same Saturday, she had a lot of pending freelance graphic projects to finish up and she also needed to stuck up on groceries for the week. Biliki went online, ordered her groceries, paid and went back to work (20 minutes + no stress + no back pain). She even managed to get most of her items at up to 20% off, as it was Food Week at Nkataa. Within 2-3 hours, her groceries arrived. Be like Biliki, Biliki is sharp, Biliki doesn’t like stress.

 

Morals of the story

  • Saves time: Online grocery shopping saves you loads of time, which you can use to do other more important things (like Biliki did, and Dahiru didn’t)
  • Saves money: Think about the petrol money, impulse shopping money, I-don’t-need-this-but-I-want-this money, let-me-buy-this-because-it-is-on-sale money Dahiru would have saved by ordering online in the comfort of his own home. Even Economists have concluded that shopping online prevents impulse/ unplanned spending which can cut your grocery bill by up to 60%. It’s great for personal budgeting, and effective meal planning too.
  • Easier to spot discounts: With online grocery shopping, you will find most of the discount notifications quicker (usually on the homepage), compared with having to walk from aisle to aisle like Dahiru, to find individual discounts for different sections if there are any at all.
  • Less stress: Generally speaking, online grocery shopping makes the process a lot less stressful. Saving time means less stress, saving money means less stress, not having to walk and lift heavy items and baskets mean less stress as well. Biliki is a witness and a partaker, stressed out no-pancake-for- dinner Dahiru on the other hand……not so much.
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