Built in Bahrain.

The idea

Most small businesses in Bahrain run on a stack of WhatsApp threads, a notebook, a spreadsheet someone's cousin built, and when the NBR comes calling, a stressful weekend with a calculator. We thought there should be one place that handles the whole picture: a real shop online, payment that works the way Gulf buyers actually pay, and a back office that turns every sale into a clean VAT invoice without anyone touching a spreadsheet.

That's Daftar. The storefront engine underneath is called Paylink, same company, two products in one app. You pick which surface you need (a public shop, full invoicing, or both) and the data flows together.

What we believe

One tool beats three. A bakery shouldn't need Shopify + QuickBooks + Stripe to run. We bundle the storefront, the payment rails, the VAT invoice, and the audit trail into one login.

Bahrain first. 10% VAT (full and simplified), Benefit Pay as a first-class option (not bolted on), Arabic typography that actually reads, and an interface that doesn't pretend the Gulf doesn't exist.

Buyers don't sign up. When someone shops on a Daftar storefront, they never have to register, remember a password, or click a verification email. They browse, pay, and get a real VAT invoice, the way checkout should feel in 2026.

Your data belongs to you. Encrypted at rest, per-row access control, an audit log for every change, and a trash bin you can recover from. No surprises.

What we make

• A public storefront at daftar.bh/<your-handle> with branded colours, an Arabic/English flip, a product catalogue, a real cart, and a checkout that takes Card, Apple Pay, Benefit Pay, and Cash on Delivery.
• A full invoicing back office: quotations, sales orders, delivery notes, invoices, credit notes, a VAT return ready to file at NBR, six reports for the parts of the business that actually matter.
• Multi-currency display across the GCC: Saudi buyers see SAR, Emirati buyers see AED, Kuwaiti buyers see KWD, and so on. You still settle in BHD.
• A WhatsApp share button on every invoice and product, the way most of our merchants actually sell.

Where we're going

Next on our list: shipping integrations with the regional couriers (Aramex, SMSA, DHL), an account-manager program for high-volume merchants, and a proper analytics layer so a merchant can see what's actually selling without exporting anything. We ship in small steps, in public, on a calendar that treats your time as ours.

Who we are

Daftar is built and run in Bahrain. We're small on purpose, close enough to every merchant that you can WhatsApp us and get a human reply the same day. We answer to our customers, not investors looking for an exit. The roadmap is what merchants tell us they need; the price list is what we'd pay ourselves.

Want to talk? Get in touch, or just open a free account and kick the tires.