2024-07-04 00:55:32
New Delhi: Tatyana Bakalchuk is the founder of Russian e-commerce company Wildberries. She has become Russia’s richest self-made businesswoman. According to the Bloomberg Billionaire Index, her estimated wealth is more than $7.4 billion i.e. about Rs 61,000 crore. Wildberries is called the ‘Amazon’ of Russia. Recently, President Putin has entrusted Tatyana with the responsibility of creating a system to compete with the international payment network SWIFT. More than 60,000 brands of goods including clothes, electronics and household items are available in Wildberries. Tatyana Bakalchuk, who was once an English teacher, started an e-commerce business by investing Rs 32,000 to run the household expenses during maternity leave. Today 48,000 employees are associated with her company. She has a 99% stake in Wildberries. Her husband owns 1% stake. Wildberries had a revenue of Rs 50,000 crore in the year 2023. Apart from Russia, this company is doing business in one and a half dozen countries including Germany, Italy and France.
The business was started in 2004
Tatyana Bakalchuk started her business in 2004. She took maternity leave for the birth of her 7th child. It was becoming difficult to raise 6 children with the income of her IT professional husband. So, Tatyana invested Rs 32,000 and laid the foundation of an online shopping platform from her flat with the help of her husband Vladislav Bakalchuk and his friend.
Initially, she used to sell clothes for the German retail company Otto. She used to take pictures of the clothes and upload them on her website. She used to do everything herself, from purchasing the goods to its delivery. Tatyana used to deliver the orders by bus and metro. Despite being the richest self-made woman in Russia, Tatyana keeps a low profile. She does not even have her own house and lives in a rented house.
What is the secret of Tatyana’s success?
The secret of Tatyana’s success is her habit of taking risks. She took big risks many times to grow her business. Due to the recession in 2008, Adidas clothes and shoes worth Rs 9 lakh did not sell. Tatyana bought them on credit and sold them for the next two years. During the pandemic in 2020, she hired 12000 new employees so that she could deliver goods to people’s homes immediately and grow her business.