If you’ve placed an order on Jumia in the recent past, you may have seen there’s many options for places you can pick up your orders. If you walk across Nairobi town for example, you’ll see a Jumia sign in very many different types of shops; from salons, to kiosks, to much more. These are places where you can either place an order, or pick it up once delivered. It is a unique approach, and it works well. It is better than struggling to find a G4S, or Aramex delivery place. It is a better approach for delivery especially in countries like Kenya where addresses are hard to work with. It is also a safe approach in regards to privacy, when you think of it.

Jumia and VIVO Energy have recently announced a partnership that will see VIVO Energy’s retail service stations become pick-up and drop-off points for Jumia deliveries. This means, you’ll soon be able order for something online, and pick it up at a Shell Petrol Station near you.

The two companies, in a statement, said they have partnered to develop and pilot a series of initiatives designed to offer additional services to customers in selected countries where both companies operate.

VIVO Energy owns Engen and Shell-branded petrol stations across Africa. The company operates in 23 African markets. Jumia on the other hand operates in 14.

Jumia said this agreement will be piloted in Kenya, Morocco, Senegal and Ivory Coast before being eventually rolled out to countries where both companies operate. This will give Jumia access to over 2,000 Fuel Stations.

It is a great idea, and it opens up online shopping to rural areas where the logistics of finding an address to deliver to have been very hard. With this plan, Jumia can effectively grow its reach as more people become confident they’ll be able to receive whatever they buy.

Safaricom has talked previously about using M-Pesa stores for delivery of Masoko items, but we are yet to see this in action. They ideally can reach many more customers in Kenya than Jumia if they wanted to, but they seem either not very committed to e-commerce, or lacking in vision despite their plans to expand beyond Kenya by 2020.