In the retail market of the Middle East, a group named WEMART is rapidly gaining prominence.
Founded in Dubai by Mr. Sun Jiansheng, a businessman from Wenzhou, China, in 2006, WEMART has evolved from a small shop into a commercial giant that integrates multiple industries such as retail supermarkets, farms, e-commerce, and logistics.
Now, with its first comprehensive mall in Saudi Arabia set to open, WEMART’s future development is attracting significant attention.
In the rapid rise of WEMART, we cannot help but see the shadow of another Middle Eastern commercial giant—LULU GROUP.
Initially targeting Indian immigrants, LULU, founded by Indian entrepreneurs, gradually expanded into a supermarket chain serving diverse communities. With its high-quality products, affordable prices, and continuous expansion strategies, LULU has become a retail giant not only in Dubai but also in the entire Middle East region.
Today, Forbes estimates its annual turnover to be as high as $8 billion, and it operates over 240 stores in the Gulf region, Egypt, India, and beyond.
Similar to LULU, WEMART also started by targeting a specific community (Chinese) and built a loyal customer base by providing quality products and services. Moreover, WEMART actively implements expansion plans, not only opening multiple branches in Dubai and Abu Dhabi but also planning to expand its business to more countries.
Although there is still a gap between WEMART and giants like LULU, the potential for WEMART’s development should not be underestimated. With its expansion into more markets like Saudi Arabia and further enhancement of brand awareness, WEMART is poised to become the next legendary commercial success story akin to LULU.
1. Starting Point: A Small Shop in Dubai
WEMART’s story began with a small shop in Dubai’s Dragon Mart Trade City. At that time, Mr. Sun Jiansheng saw the demand for daily necessities among the Chinese community and decided to open a supermarket named “Wenzhou Supermarket” to provide convenient shopping services.
Although this small shop was not large in scale, it carried the founder’s business dreams and insistence on quality.
With the continuous expansion of its business, WEMART International City store was grandly opened in 2010, marking an important milestone in WEMART’s development and laying a solid foundation for its subsequent rapid growth.
2. Farms and E-commerce: Innovation and Expansion
In the process of growth and maturity, WEMART has always pursued innovation. To meet the Chinese community’s preference for Chinese vegetables, WEMART built a green farm in the desert of the United Arab Emirates.
This farm, covering an area of about 40,000 square meters, operates based on the principles of green, healthy, and organic farming, cultivating over forty varieties of Chinese green vegetables. The successful operation of the farm not only provides WEMART with a stable source of goods but also serves as its unique competitive advantage.
Meanwhile, WEMART also keenly recognized the enormous potential of the e-commerce market. In 2016, WEMART’s online mall was officially launched, becoming the first Chinese online mall in the Middle East.
The online mall offers nearly ten thousand high-quality products and provides excellent shopping experiences and door-to-door logistics services, quickly gaining unanimous praise from users.
The successful establishment of the e-commerce platform opened up new sales channels for WEMART and brought in more customer flow and revenue.
3. Full Industry Chain and Diversified Development
With the dual support of farms and e-commerce, WEMART’s business scope further expanded.
In 2017, WEMART Logistics was officially established, providing comprehensive guarantees for the import, export, transportation, customs clearance, and warehousing of goods. This ensured the completeness of WEMART’s services and provided strong support for its subsequent rapid development.
With the continuous expansion of its business, WEMART began to venture into more areas. Its subsidiary, Yaoyi Teahouse, promotes Chinese tea culture overseas, providing a place for Chinese people to enjoy Chinese tea culture. In addition, WEMART also entered the fields of bread processing, bulk sales, and more, continuously enriching its business formats and product lines.
To further enhance its brand influence, in 2019, WEMART launched a new brand, WEMART, and opened a flagship store covering an area of approximately 4,000 square meters and a 24-hour convenience store.
At the same time, WEMART’s self-built multifunctional intelligent warehouse officially went into operation, realizing a full set of industry chain operations from production, procurement, storage to sales. These series of measures greatly enhanced WEMART’s brand influence and market competitiveness.
4. A New Journey in Saudi Arabia: Challenges and Opportunities
After solidifying its market position in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, WEMART began to look towards broader markets.
In April 2023, WEMART announced the start of its first project in Saudi Arabia—the WEMART Riyadh Comprehensive Mall. This marked WEMART’s official entry into the Saudi market, ushering in new development opportunities.
As an important country in the Middle East, Saudi Arabia has enormous potential in the retail market. The WEMART Riyadh flagship store is located in a bustling area of Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, and will create a comprehensive shopping center covering an area of 6,000 square meters.
The center is expected to open in November 2024 and will adopt the WEMART model of combining supermarkets with food courts, providing Saudi consumers with a new shopping experience.
To ensure the supply chain system in the Saudi market, WEMART will also build a warehouse and logistics center covering approximately 10,000 square meters in the Dammam area of Saudi Arabia.
At the same time, following the success of the WEMART green farm in Dubai, WEMART has signed a contract for a 350-acre green farm in the suburbs of Saudi Arabia, planning to cultivate Chinese fruits and vegetables favored by Chinese people to meet the needs of the Chinese community in Saudi Arabia.
However, the competition in the Saudi market is also extremely fierce. Compared with Dubai, there are differences in the market environment, consumer habits, and cultural backgrounds in Saudi Arabia. Therefore, WEMART faces many challenges in the Saudi market and needs to continuously adjust and optimize its business model and operation strategies.
5. WEMART and LULU: Different Starting Points, Common Goals
In the Middle Eastern retail market, both LULU Hypermarket and WEMART have won the favor of consumers with their unique business strategies.
WEMART and LULU share many similarities. Firstly, both emphasize providing high-quality products and affordable prices. WEMART’s self-built green farm in Dubai provides a stable source of goods and a unique competitive advantage, while LULU has won consumers
‘ favor with its rich product selection and reasonable prices.
Secondly, both have implemented active expansion plans. WEMART has embarked on the path of expanding new stores to broaden its business scope, while LULU has rapidly expanded globally with its strong financial strength and brand influence.
On the other hand, WEMART and LULU have significant differences in their foundations.
LULU initially targeted Indian immigrants as its main customer base, while WEMART targeted Chinese customers. This difference not only reflects their respective market positioning but also reveals their different development paths in the Middle Eastern retail market.
The Indian population in the Middle East is large, providing a vast market space for LULU. However, with China’s rapidly increasing investment in the Middle East, more and more Chinese people are entering this market, providing new opportunities for WEMART’s development.
According to statistics, the Chinese population in the UAE is increasing year by year, becoming one of the important foreign communities in the UAE. At the same time, China’s investment in Arab countries is also growing rapidly, with Saudi Arabia accepting a large amount of Chinese investment. These changes lay the foundation for WEMART to move towards the development direction of LULU.
Starting with Chinese people as its main customer base, WEMART has gradually established a good brand image in the Middle East. They have a deep understanding of Chinese consumption habits and needs, providing products and services that cater to Chinese tastes. This precise market positioning has enabled WEMART to stand out in the fiercely competitive market.
At the same time, as China’s influence in the Middle East continues to grow, WEMART has the opportunity to leverage this trend to actively expand its business scope and provide high-quality shopping experiences to more consumers.
The success of WEMART and LULU fully demonstrates that foreign nationals can achieve great success in the Middle East. Innovation and expansion are crucial in the retail industry.
At this new historical starting point, we look forward to WEMART continuing to maintain its development momentum and becoming an important force in the Middle Eastern and global retail markets. At the same time, we also hope that more Chinese enterprises can go global, explore international markets, and provide consumers worldwide with better shopping experiences and services.