16 1 月 iCarry, Direct Current Co., Ltd. — Don’t shop till you drop, A one-stop shop for the best Taiwanese souvenirs

When travelling, we like to bring back souvenirs for our friends and family, but to do so, we often have to wait in long queues and go around the area since the shops are not always close to each other. We might end up spending hours just to buy everything we want. iCarry provides an e-commerce service that allows travelers to buy without needing to pick up the products at the stores themselves. After a purchase is made on their platform, iCarry then delivers the products directly to the designated airport or hotel. Travelers no longer need to spend time looking for the shops, queuing, or carrying the heavy load back to their hotels. They consequently have more time to do the real traveling.

iCarry Team

The souvenir cross-border e-commerce site iCarry was co-founded by Jamie Lee and Tesla Chen in 2016. The intention was to introduce the best Made-in-Taiwan products to their friends around the world. “We intuitively thought if we were to promote Taiwanese products, traditional business models would not be innovative enough, and would not benefit stores because of the costs and product expiration date. After doing some research, we decided to focus on the booming backpacking market,” said Jamie.

Jamie (Co-founder of iCarry)

Aggregated 500 plus popular brands, selling to the world

“If you find something troublesome, let iCarry take care of it!” Lee said with a smile. Since its foundation, iCarry decided to work with iconic Taiwanese foods and collaborate with well-known souvenir stores that have long-standing reputation. But here comes a problem: These stores are already very successful, why would they be interested in listing their products on iCarry? So, at first, it was difficult for iCarry to find willing collaborators, but the team was sincere and diligent. It also solved sophisticated logistics problems for the stores. Gradually, it won over 500 plus brands, such as Chia Te Bakery, Hi Walk, Sugar & Spice, Jiu Zhen Nan, O-NONG, Kuaiche, and Yu Jan Shin.

The coronavirus outbreak this year has brought the number of international travelers to Taiwan down to almost zero. At the time when tourists no longer shop in physical stores, iCarry’s e-commerce business is seeing explosive growth. Even though tourists may not be able to travel to Taiwan, they can still buy the freshest and the most popular snacks and pastries on iCarry. The team’s familiarity with the domestic’s and overseas’ logistics allow it to overcome the complications of language barriers, FDA verifications, customs clearance, and international parcels. It has helped the Taiwanese souvenir industry to withstand the sharp drop in sales in the early days of the pandemic, and continue to sell products to the world.

Extending services, integrating offline cash flow and services

iCarry started out as a travel e-commerce platform, and has established a good reputation and favorability. It has now expanded into 14 other markets, including Hong Kong, Macau, Japan, Singapore and the U.S. Aside from shipping Taiwanese products overseas, iCarry now also provides souvenirs from other places — Japan, for example.

At the same time, iCarry is also extending its service from online cross-border e-commerce all the way to offline in-store services. It uses mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) devices to combine retail, cash flow and logistics. Through integrating mobile payment methods and working with logistics companies, iCarry enables the stores to serve customers paying with various currencies and to satisfy the demand for easy shopping. iCarry is also offering S2B2C solutions for retailers, opening up more business opportunities for both.

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