A series of Ukrainian strikes on the warehouses of Russia’s largest online retailer have potentially set hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of inventory on fire, sparking an online furore among the country’s embattled small business owners.
Over the weekend, Ukrainian drones struck Wildberry distribution centers in Elektrostal, Moscow region, and Kotovsk, Tambov region. A second wave of attacks hit logistics warehouses in the Krasnodar and Stavropol regions early on Wednesday, and state media in the southwestern Voronezh region also reported that a drone strike led to the closure of a Wildberry warehouse there late Wednesday into Thursday.
The strikes on Wildberry, the Russian equivalent of e-commerce giant Amazon, have brought Moscow’s war with Ukraine even closer, disrupting the lives and livelihoods of ordinary Russians. And they are intensifying Ukraine’s economic warfare campaign, which has seen wave after wave of drone strikes on oil refineries, leading to long lines at gas stations across Russia.
The attacks were also deadly. According to regional officials, seven people died in Kotovsk, one in Elektrostal. According to the governor of the Krasnodar region, at least one person has died as a result of the latest strikes in southern Russia.
Kyiv has acknowledged attacks on Wildberry warehouses and said the facilities are legitimate military targets because they supply frontline Russian troops in Ukraine. In a statement Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said, without naming Wildberry, that “major logistics facilities were damaged” and that the warehouses were being used “to supply sanctioned components for the production of drones and navigation equipment.”
The Russian government denies that Wildberry supplies the Russian army. A search for “military supplies” on the Wildries website on Thursday returned more than 78,000 items, including body armor, first aid kits and rations. The site also offers drone equipment, including FPV goggles and kit that can be used on the battlefield.
The Kremlin acknowledged the economic damage caused by the strikes. Asked on Wednesday about possible measures to protect strike-hit businesses, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said of Wildberry: “The situation is really difficult, given the losses incurred both by the company itself and by small and medium-sized businesses.”
The economic consequences of the strikes are not yet clear. The Russian publication Forbes cites preliminary estimates that Wildberry has lost up to 9% of its warehouse space, and restoring this capacity could cost the company as much as 33 billion rubles ($421 million). Losses for sellers of goods, the report says, could amount to at least 150 billion rubles ($1.9 billion). The business newspaper Kommersant estimated that the cumulative drone attacks affected about 10% of the company’s total logistics capacity.
CNN has reached out to Wildberry for comment on the financial impact of the strikes and allegations that its warehouses supply the Russian military.
Russian entrepreneurs using Wildberry for distribution have used social media to complain about the strikes and the devastating impact on their businesses.
“About 40% of our business burned,” one fashion retailer said in a Threads post.
“Of course, compared to human lives, this is just money. The most important thing is that we and our loved ones are safe and sound. Never before have we stored such a large volume of products in the warehouses of the marketplace (Wildberry). However, due to new requirements, we had to urgently remove the goods from our own warehouse, repackage them and send them to Wildberry.”
In another video that went viral on Ukrainian accounts, a Russian retailer whose goods were stocked in Wildberry warehouses in the Krasnodar and Stavropol regions says: “I just want this SMO (special military operation) to end.”
Several Russian retailers have complained that Wildberry’s terms of service were recently changed to stipulate that the online retailer is not liable for damage caused by drone attacks.
In an interview published by the business daily RBC, Wildberry founder Tatyana Kim said her company is discussing with Russian authorities the possibility of tax breaks and other measures to help sellers affected by the attacks.
“Today we spoke with one of the departments – specifically with the Federal Tax Service – about the possible development of measures to ease the tax burden for affected entrepreneurs,” she said. “This is not about completely eliminating taxes, but rather about the possibility of providing deferrals or similar measures,” Kim said.
Ukrainian commentators, on the other hand, said Wildberry’s complaints did not explain the bigger picture: the Russians, they said, were ignoring the fact that Moscow launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, which ultimately led to Ukraine’s campaign of deep strikes against Russia.
Katerina Boguslavskaya, who posts on X as “Katya from Kharkov”, said: “Another stream of videos of Russians crying about the ‘shock’ and ‘injustice’ of the Wildberry warehouse strikes. It doesn’t even occur to them how unfair it seemed when we were just living our lives, not bothering anyone, in our own country and our own homes, right up until their missiles started tearing our cities apart in the cold winter in the morning.”
Anton Gerashchenko, a Ukrainian social media influencer and former official, said Russians should blame Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“The Russians have learned that their country is at war. The next step is to understand who is responsible for all the damage caused to Russia (Putin),” he wrote on X.
“Wildberrys is no longer just an online marketplace for clothing and home goods. The platform sells weapons, body armor, drones, components for drones and fiber optics used for drones. All of these items are used in the war against Ukraine and help kill Ukrainians. This is why such objects are legitimate military targets for the Ukrainian Armed Forces.”
Russians are unlikely to direct public anger at Putin, especially in a country where dissent is not tolerated and criticism of the military is outlawed. But the Wildberry strikes are bringing war to Russians in a new way.