Online shopping booms in Kuwait amid COVID-19 fears

  • Date: 05-Apr-2021
  • Source: Kuwait Times
  • Sector:Healthcare
  • Country:Kuwait
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Online shopping booms in Kuwait amid COVID-19 fears

KUWAIT: With a worrying increase in COVID-19 cases in Kuwait, there have been marked changes in the residents' habit as more of them now avoid going to public places and fill their needs by online shopping. Modhi Al-Otaibi, a 46-year-old retiree from the Kuwaiti Ministry of Electricity, said she purchases her grocery from online sites, and all the needed items such as vegetables, fruits, bread, cheese and clothes are just a click away.

For Hamad Al-Enzi, a 35-year-old employee of a local bank, the hands-on visit to the old Al-Mubarakiya market for meat is no longer necessary, because his mobile phone serves him well in ordering meat directly from the supplier Al-Mawashi company.

Currently, it comes as no surprise to see many delivery trucks loaded with goods travelling across Kuwait. "This scene was imposed by the coronavirus outbreak and encouraged by companies which provided and developed their online services for customers, and competed through their offers,“ Khalid Al-Otaibi, vice-president of the Kuwait Union of Consumer Cooperative Societies, told Xinhua. E-shopping saves time and effort and provides safety in such circumstances of COVID-19, Otaibi said.

Research showed that the online grocery in Kuwait exceeded $500 million in 2020, with expectations of a further jump