The Hindu Business Line : Online shops upbeat on festive season biz

"We expect online purchases to shoot up by over 100 per cent during the period leading up to Diwali. Even compared year-on-year, online transactions are estimated to rise significantly with an increase in the Internet base and enhanced awareness," said Mr Pankaj Chandra, head of e-commerce, Sify.com.

The momentum gained in the last few days could be expected to continue till three days before Diwali, he said. "Once the buying spree for Diwali ends, we will see a separate category of people placing order for gifts for the Bhai Duj festival in northern India. In fact, anywhere between 15 and 20 per cent of the annual online transactions happens at this time of the year," Mr Chandra added.

"Against an average of 400-500 orders per day normally, we are booking up to 600 orders per day and expect this to peak to over 1,000 orders per day by the middle of next week," said Mr K. Vaitheeswaran, Chief Operating Officer, Fabmall.com.

He said between 25 and 30 per cent of the online order placement was by non-resident Indians sending gifts to their brethren in India.

According to Mr Gautam Thakar, Country Manager, eBay India marketplace, "We see increased buying in categories such as electronics, apparel, and jewellery. Consumers buy jewellery to gift, while electronics appliances and apparel is more of a personal purchase."

Mr Thakar said that while most of the buying was by end-consumers, companies are yet to embrace the Internet for purchasing corporate gifts. "While corporates do check out a lot of catalogues online when deciding on official gifts, the actual buying takes place offline," he said, adding that orders from smaller towns such as Nagpur, Lucknow, Vishakapatnam were on the rise.

Last year, the Internet and Mobile Association of India had announced that 3,45,000-plus sales of over Rs 53 crore were transacted on the Net during the Diwali season.

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Online shops upbeat on festive season biz