By: Ravi Sinha
Track2Realty Exclusive
What appears to be the bane of retail, whether organised or neighbourhood, has been spotted by some innovative entrepreneurs, of late. They are the tech savvy smart players in the segment who have realised that instead of getting into “dog eats dog” competition, it is better to spot the gaps that the upwardly mobile discerning consumers are finding and bridge the trust deficit in retailing to cater to this segment. Welcome to the world of e-tailing, the next generation of retail business that promises comfort & convenience for the hassled consumers and a fortune for the retailers.
The core idea of e-tailing is to let the consumer shop from the comfort of his home for groceries and get it delivered at his doorstep. This saves the customer running from one shop to another to find all that he needs.
Take for instance, www.mygrahak.com, and online supermarket that aims to enhance shopping experience with no queue, no after-delivery hassles and cash-on-delivery offer with a card swipe machine at your door step. The customers can also talk/chat with the agents of MyGrahak online. In the bargain the NCR-based online supermarket has touched a sales figure of Rs. 1.5 crore a month within a short span of 14 months and the growth rate has been over 30-40% month on month basis. With increased focus and investment on ware houses, the supermarket aims to cater to nine leading cities shortly and then expand its footprint to pan-India.
Analysts tracking the sector feel that e-tail at this point of time is not creating new customers, just poaching on the dissatisfied customers from physical retail shop to online bouquet, as in terms of supply chain hurdles they stand at par with the retail stores. However, notwithstanding these teething problems the market forecast is quite bullish and as per some rough estimate the virtual retail is expected to touch a market size of $70 billion (Rs. 3,56,000 crore) by 2020 in India from the present Rs. 2,700 crore. The e-tail market is also expected to see a phase of consolidation in the process where many “me-too” ventures will either be shut down or taken over by the serious players.
MyGrahak CEO Ambuj Jhunjhunwala asserts that the market is big enough to be explored with more and more people coming on internet and transacting on internet. According to him it is a game of making customers used to this format of shopping.
“Customers are constrained by time and choice. Our study finds that customers are normally shopping over 4-5 locations but time constrained is often limiting their choice for shopping. So, customers are buying from places nearest to them as of now. So they are constrained by choices and also several stores in the country do not have options for city people coming out of different cultures. Our effort is to combine those shopping at one location so that you have a product choice at your disposal,” says Ambuj.
….to be continued
