By the time Yvette Uwimpaye became a mother for the first time, she had already made a defining decision: she would not wait for opportunity. She would create it.
Confined at home with a newborn, routine activities such as going to the market suddenly became exhausting. What many considered simple errands turned into logistical challenges. In those quiet, demanding days, an idea took shape.
“After giving birth, I realised how difficult it is for many people to go to the market,” she recalls. “Some are busy, some live far away, others are new residents or new mothers like me. I kept asking myself: why not create a solution online?”
That question gave birth to Murukali, the platform that would later become Rwanda’s first online grocery store and one of the country’s most recognisable e-commerce marketplaces.
Today, more than a decade later, Murukali hosts over 1,000 businesses, employs 15 people, and connects Rwandan producers to customers at home and in the diaspora. But the journey began long before technology, funding, or even clarity—rooted instead in resilience.
Uwimpaye lost both her parents during the Genocide against the Tutsi, an experience that shaped her outlook on life and work.
“Life taught me early that nothing is guaranteed,” she says. “So when I build something, I don’t take it lightly.”
Her interest in business was sparked in secondary school by a teacher who told her that everyone carries the seeds of enterprise within them. She later studied economics, determined to solve real problems, even if she did not yet know how.
The problem became clear after motherhood. Grocery shopping was physically demanding. Professionals were time-poor. New residents struggled to navigate markets. The solution, she believed, lay in digital access.
“I wanted to build a bridge—between producers and consumers, between local businesses and global buyers.”
Launching Murukali, however, was far from easy. Rwanda’s e-commerce ecosystem was still nascent. Banks had few products for startups. Digital payments were limited. Uwimpaye had no technical background and had to depend on developers, some of whom left midway, draining time and resources.
“There were moments when people asked why I was stressing myself when I already had a small business,” she says. “But I gave myself four years to try. I wrote it in my business plan and promised myself I would fight.”
She did. Murukali started as a simple online grocery store, pioneering a model that did not yet exist in Rwanda. Slowly, customers began to trust the service. Deliveries became reliable. The product range expanded—from food to fashion, furniture, beauty and homeware.
Trust, she learned, was the real currency.
“People feared paying online and not receiving what they ordered,” she says. Murukali introduced a return policy—unusual in local retail at the time. “It was a sacrifice, but trust mattered more than profit.”
The platform’s impact soon went beyond convenience. One small-scale entrepreneur, a woman making handmade kitenge bonnets, had been repeatedly rejected by physical markets. Murukali photographed her products, listed them, and promoted them. Orders followed. Five years later, her business is thriving.
“That is Murukali’s heart,” Uwimpaye says. “Giving people a chance.”
From earning just Rwf15,000 a week in its early days to handling millions, the platform’s growth mirrors the rise of Rwanda’s digital economy itself. It now serves major brands while enabling small vendors to reach customers as far away as London.
“Someone in the diaspora can buy Rwandan products online. That’s the power of being digital.”
Now a mother of three, Uwimpaye continues to balance entrepreneurship and family, driven by purpose and possibility. Her message to young women is clear:
“Don’t wait to be perfect. Start. Confidence comes from action. Be brave enough to try, even when no one else believes yet.”
Murukali exists, she says, because she chose courage over comfort.
“If I had listened to fear, it would not exist today. I chose to try—and that made all the difference.”
Source: The New Times
