A multi-vendor marketplace built for South Africa — local sellers, local delivery, local payments — connecting urban SA shoppers with the makers and merchants around them.
South African shoppers default to global marketplaces because finding what's actually around them is harder than ordering an import. Meanwhile, the makers who could compete on convenience can't be found.
SA shoppers default to Takealot or imported Amazon stuff because finding local makers and merchants is a slog. Independent SA sellers can't compete on cost with imports — but local + same-day-delivery is a real differentiator if shoppers can actually find them. Today, that discovery layer doesn't exist outside Instagram and word-of-mouth.
If you live in Pretoria East and you need fresh-baked bread, hand-made soap, or a beadwork gift today — Takealot can't ship it same-day, and you don't know that there are twelve makers within 5 km of you who can.
UrbanFind is built equally for the two sides of the marketplace — shoppers who want to buy local without faff, and vendors who want reach without an upfront cost.
Drop in your suburb or current location. UrbanFind only shows vendors within your chosen radius — so distance is real.
10 secFilter by category, rating, same-day delivery, or maker story. Discover the dorpie shops, kasi makers and suburb merchants near you.
2 minPay with Yoco · Payfast · Peach · Ozow or card. Courier dispatches same-day if you order before 14:00 weekdays.
Same dayRate your maker, leave a review, save them as a favourite. WhatsApp updates from the seller for reorders next time.
OngoingFree vendor account. Verify your business (BizID or proof of trade) and your delivery suburb. No setup fee, no upfront cost.
5 minUpload your catalogue — photos, prices in ZAR, stock counts, delivery options. WhatsApp-friendly editing for makers without a desktop.
~25 minYou appear in suburb search the moment your products go live. WhatsApp notifications for new orders. Print picking lists. Hand to courier.
Live nowPayouts to your bank via Yoco settlement. Weekly batch or instant (for a small fee). Dashboard tracks every cent.
WeeklyUrbanFind matches Takealot's convenience on the things that matter — search, same-day delivery, secure payments — while keeping rands in SA hands and putting a face to your makers.
Search by suburb, postal code or GPS. UrbanFind only surfaces vendors who can deliver to your area. No more "looks great — sorry, doesn't ship to Limpopo".
Order before 14:00 on a weekday and most metros are same-evening. Outside metros, next-day via TCG, Aramex or Pargo lockers.
Every order goes to a verified SA seller. No drop-shipped imports masquerading as local. We surface the maker's story and where they're based.
Pretoria East or Mitchells Plain or Umlazi — pick your suburb and only relevant vendors show. Sortable by distance, rating, or delivery speed.
Every seller is verified — business registration or proof of trade, ID-linked owner, dispute history visible. Buy with confidence.
Order confirmation, dispatch notification, courier tracking and delivery confirmation — all sent on WhatsApp. No email-checking required.
UrbanFind is built so makers and merchants in SA can start selling online without a website, without a development budget, and without the discoverability tax that Instagram and word-of-mouth alone can't escape.
Your products appear in your suburb's search results the moment they go live. No SEO. No ad budget. Just signal where your shoppers already are.
Zero monthly fee, zero setup fee. We take a small per-sale commission on completed orders. If you don't sell, you don't pay.
See orders, revenue, top products, customer locations, repeat-buyer rate — all in real time. Export to CSV. WhatsApp daily summary.
Weekly batched payouts to your bank account, or instant (for a small fee). All cleared through Yoco's SA-licensed settlement rail.
Have a supplier? Plug their feed into your UrbanFind store. We handle stock sync. Optional — not required for makers.
Ten broad categories, each with sub-filters for vendor location, delivery type, price range and certifications. Built around what SA shoppers and makers told us they need — not generic e-commerce buckets.
UrbanFind operates suburb-level discovery across South Africa's major metros. Vendor counts reflect active sellers as of this month — and we onboard ~80 new vendors per week.
Mature, mainstream choices. Hosted in AWS af-south-1 (Cape Town) so SA shoppers get sub-50ms response times and POPIA data-locality is real, not aspirational.
We picked SA-licensed payment gateways, SA courier networks with same-day capacity, and WhatsApp Business for the only messaging channel most South Africans actually open. International rails come later — local first.
Default checkout for SA cards. Also handles vendor payouts to bank accounts via Yoco's settlement rail.
Card · EFT · instant-EFT · Masterpass · SnapScan. Widest SA bank coverage and instant payment confirmation.
Enterprise gateway for larger vendors. Multi-currency support, recurring billing, sub-merchant onboarding.
Instant-EFT for shoppers without cards. Massive in SA — clears in under 10 seconds, no card fees.
Same-day in metros for vendors who opt in. Nationwide next-day. API-integrated label printing.
SA's largest network. Overnight + same-day metro. Reliable rural coverage too.
Locker-to-locker delivery. 3 500+ pickup points across SA. Lower cost for vendors and buyers.
PEP-store-network lockers. Most affordable nationwide option — perfect for low-margin makers.
Order confirmation, dispatch alerts, vendor-shopper chat — all via the channel most South Africans actually open.
Geocoding for suburb addresses, distance-matrix for radius search, autocomplete for delivery addresses.
Optional ID lookup for vendor onboarding. Linked to BizID where applicable. Encrypted at rest — POPIA-compliant.
Built-in dispute flow with held escrow until resolution. UrbanFind mediates · refund or release based on evidence.
A marketplace is only as good as the trust between shoppers and vendors. We do the work in the background so both sides can transact confidently — and we don't hide the rules.
Every vendor passes a verification step — business registration where applicable, proof of trade, ID-linked owner, and a real physical or trading address. Verification badges visible on every shopfront.
All payments go through SA-licensed gateways (Yoco · Payfast · Peach · Ozow). Funds are held until delivery is confirmed; vendors don't receive payout until the buyer is satisfied — escrow as standard.
Built-in dispute flow — open within 7 days of delivery. We review both sides, escrow holds funds, and either refund or release based on evidence. Most disputes resolve within 48 hours.
Hosted in AWS af-south-1 (Cape Town). PII encrypted at rest. Vendor-shopper details masked by default. Data-deletion requests honoured within 30 days. Documented retention policy on every page.
Every vendor page shows who they are, where they're based, how long they've been on UrbanFind, total fulfilled orders, and customer reviews. No anonymous shopfronts — accountability is the deal.
If the product never arrives, arrives broken, or is materially different to the listing — UrbanFind refunds you in full. We absorb the risk so you don't have to chase the vendor.
Eight honest answers on onboarding, payouts, delivery, POPIA, and what's coming next.
Whether you're shopping or selling — UrbanFind is the local-first answer to global marketplaces. Same-day delivery, suburb-level discovery, SA payment rails, vendors you can trust. Pick your side.