Many immigrants from Asia complain that buying food products from home, such as hot sauces from China or snacks from Japan, is not very convenient in the United States. In most cities, there are a few scattered Asian grocery stores with limited selection.

That frustration inspired Alex Zhou, following his graduation from Kansas State University, to start an e-commerce business that he predicts will generate $100 million in sales this year.

Alex Zhou, founder and CEO, Yamibuy

Zhou launched Yamibuy.com in 2013, initially specializing in selling food products to Chinese consumers living in the United States. The website has since expanded its selection to include products from other Asian countries, and Zhou says its sales have been doubling every year.

Hoping to continue that growth, Yamibuy recently secured $10 million in first-round financing, led by venture capital firm GGV Capital of Beijing.

To learn more about this fast-growing e-retailer, Internet Retailer recently spoke with Zhou, the founder and CEO of Yamibuy.com.

Internet Retailer: Tell us about the recent performance of your business.

Alex Zhou: Our business is growing by more than 100% every year. Yamibuy has more than 50 million users and our sales reached $50 million last year. Currently, our monthly sales have surpassed $10 million, so we are expecting $100 million sales in 2017.

IR: What is the key to your success?

Zhou: Yamibuy is unique in that we only focus on a specific group of users. We also conduct very in-depth research to serve our consumers, which are Asian consumers living in the United States. We estimate that there are about 11 million Chinese-Americans and 21 million Asian-Americans. If you look globally, there are about 100 million overseas Asians who may become our users.

IR: Can you describe some of your moves in merchandising?

Zhou: At first we sold directly to consumers, but recently we added a marketplace business. For example, we have started to work with China’s largest e-retailer JD.com Inc., No.1 in the Internet Retailer China 500, to allow JD to sell books through our marketplace section.

IR: What are your major categories?

Zhou: Food products is still our key category, accounting for 50% of our sales. But our inventory has also expanded to other categories, including electronics, cosmetics and so on.

IR: How do you solve the logistics problem of delivering goods that come from Asia?

Zhou: We work really hard on making shipping faster. We operate a warehouse in Los Angeles, Calif., covering about 200,000 square feet. Working with our shipping partner, we have started to offer same-day shipping in L.A. recently.We also plan to open a new warehouse in New Jersey this year to better serve customers on the East Coast, hoping it will allow them to receive their orders within one to three days.

IR: Do you offer cross-border shipping in some cases, ordering products from abroad after the customer has placed the order?

Zhou: Since we can’t keep every product in a large catalog, we recently started to provide a cross-border direct shipping option for consumers. I am glad to see many consumers have more options when they buy food products from Japan.

IR: How many workers do you have?

Zhou: We now have more than 300 employees. It is really hard to hire Chinese IT workers in L.A. To solve this problem, we recently opened a technology center in Xian, China. We also opened an office in Hangzhou, the city where Alibaba based in, to recruit more e-commerce operations experts.

IR: How do you compete with local Asian grocery stores?

Zhou: We have more selection and better prices. For about 70% of our products, our price is cheaper than at those grocery stores.

IR: What’s next?

Zhou: We are happy to raise $10 million in our first round of funding. We are planning to enhance our logistics capabilities and expand our business into Canada and Europe.