There are already specialist grocery portals operating in India’s ecommerce market, which is projected to reach $43 billion in value by 2019, according to Nomura.īigBasket, the category leader, last week announced that it had carved out three new revenue streams in collaboration with local kirana stores, including on-demand express delivery, sale of private label staples to offline stores, and co-branded kirana pickup points. The company said it sold gross merchandise worth $3 billion last year and aims at closing this year with $8 billion in sales. Other categories of interest would be home furnishing and furniture, he said.Īt present, Flipkart offers over 80 categories of products through sellers on its marketplace, with fashion being the largest product line. “We will try and launch as many categories as possible and FMCG will be one of those categories,” said Ankit Nagori, senior vicepresident in-charge of Flipkart’s commerce platform. The India Brand Equity Foundation estimates that food and grocery accounted for 69% of India’s $490-billion (Rs 300-lakh crore) retail sector in 2013, followed by apparel at 8%.Īccording to people familiar with Flipkart’s expansion plans, the addition of groceries on its portal is part of a larger strategy to include newer categories and business lines that will help boost revenue and chalk up profits.Īll these moves are seen as a runup to an eventual public listing of the shares of the Bengaluru company within the next two years. “In the next six months, we will see online vertical players, horizontal players as well as offline players coming online to sell groceries,” he predicted.
“It (grocery) is too large a space for someone to miss,” said Arvind Singhal, chairman of retail advisory firm Technopak.
0 kommentar(er)
