A new business-to-business news site focusing on the retail and consumer goods industry in South Africa and Africa, launched in February 2020, promises journalism and research-driven content, providing highly independent, exclusive news, opinions and analysis on one of the fastest-growing and most sophisticated business sectors in Africa
RetailingAfrica.com will focus on retailers, brands and consumer insights across Africa, including the rise of e-commerce, mcommerce and the middle class, the infrastructure boom in logistics, the rapid adoption of technology, and much more.
“There has never been a better time to launch a journalism-driven retail-focused new media brand, with the Africa Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) promising to be a gamechanger on the African continent over the coming decade, bringing down trade barriers and creating the biggest trading block globally,” said founding editor and publisher, Louise Burgers. “And in challenging times, business-to-business media is critically important in supporting industry and providing strategy and solutions for business recovery.”
“Retail is one of the fastest-transforming industries in the world and Africa has its own unique challenges and opportunities for brands and is, in fact, leading global innovation in many areas through necessity, such as mcommerce, financing and logistics, in particular.”
Burgers has launched and steered some of South Africa’s biggest media brands in the marketing, media, advertising and FMCG retailing industries. She holds a Master’s degree in strategy and was an award-winning editor of various industry trade publications, including Bizcommunity.com and AdVantage, Marketing Mix and Progressive Retailing magazines.
The new media brand is a partnership with another respected media and marketing industry veteran and award-winning editor, Herman Manson, the founder of leading advertising and marketing news portal, MarkLives.com. As a sister site to MarkLives, Retailing Africa will be promoted to the MarkLives’ readership of 40 000 marketing and advertising agency executives.
Manson and Burgers have been colleagues at different media brands for more than a decade; both believe that journalism-driven news is the most-trusted model for the media industry going forward to claw back the credibility of media in this era of ‘fake news’. The success of MarkLives.com is what has spurred them on to launch RetailingAfrica.com.
The venture has enticed a number of industry sponsors to the platform prior to launch, including ad agency Ogilvy South Africa, data solutions company Apex Visibility and rising independent marketing agency DUKE.
“Our experience with MarkLives has proven that media projects practicing old-school journalism can achieve commercial success, contribute to the health of the broader industry it covers and do so in a commercially sustainable way, without compromising its promise of editorial independence to readers, or resorting to click-bait,” said Manson.
“Trade journalism has been left for dead by much of the media industry. We all thought the beat was dead. Now we know it’s not. Expect Retailing Africa to shake up the sector — it is here to disrupt the business-to-business media landscape. Initial feedback from sponsors and industry players have been overwhelmingly positive and we enter the market at a crucial and transformative time for retailing in Africa,” he added.
