Towering columns of black smoke filled the sky above burning warehouses belonging to Wildberries — Russia’s largest online retailer and its equivalent of Amazon — as Ukrainian drone strikes turned the facilities into raging infernos.
The first wave of attacks struck over the weekend, hitting sites in Elektrostal, located just east of Moscow, and in the Tambov region. Those strikes left eight people dead and many more injured. Then, early Wednesday, two additional Wildberries warehouses — one in the southern Krasnodar region and another in the Stavropol region — were set ablaze in follow-up attacks, claiming one more life and wounding 14 others.
These strikes are part of Ukraine’s ongoing aerial campaign targeting sites inside Russia, with Kyiv aiming to weaken the country’s wartime economy and force ordinary Russian citizens to feel the impact of what the Kremlin calls its invasion of Ukraine.
So what exactly is Wildberries, and why has it become a target?
Wildberries was founded in 2004 by Tatyana Kim, who was a teacher and young mother at the time. The company initially focused on clothing sales before expanding into a full-scale e-commerce platform recognizable by its signature purple logo. By April, Forbes Russia placed Kim’s net worth at $8.1 billion.
Today, the platform sells virtually everything — clothing, books, cosmetics, toys, home appliances, sporting goods, and more. It even has an online pharmacy section and a travel booking feature for flights and hotels.
In 2021, Kim purchased a small bank and transformed it into what is now known as Wildberries Bank, though that institution has since faced sanctions from both the United Kingdom and the European Union.
Kim stated last year that the company operates more than 200 facilities covering over 5.2 million square meters — roughly 55 million square feet — with expansion plans for 2026 that include new warehouses in Belarus and Kazakhstan, where Wildberries already does business.
According to Sergei Semko, a leading analyst at Data Insight, a Moscow-based firm that tracks online retail trends in Russia, between 500,000 and 800,000 sellers do business through the Wildberries platform. He told The Associated Press that Wildberries currently handles 52% of all online orders placed in Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy stopped short of naming Wildberries specifically, but he has maintained that the targeted facilities were involved in supplying equipment and technical components to the Russian military. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov pushed back on Tuesday, saying that claim
