At a time when pure-play e-commerce companies were burning millions of dollars to get people shop online, Tata Group was silently working on a strategy wherein it could leverage the robust network of its retail ventures to create a seamless shopping experience.

The Group, which finally entered the e-commerce rat-race to join other conglomerates such as Aditya Birla Group and Arvind Group, with the launch of its omni-channel marketplace TataCLiQ on Friday, aims to be the number one e-commerce portal in India in the next two years. TataCLiQ is owned by Tata Unistore, in which Tata Industries has a 90-per cent stake.

Curated marketplace While Tata is not the first one to have an omni-channel strategy, it may be the first to be a curated and closed marketplace, where over 400 brands can use their respective physical stores to allow customers to browse on the website and pick the product from a nearby store or get it delivered in less than three hours. It will also allow faster exchange and return of goods.

Arvind Internet had has recently launched a similar model with NNNow.com, Aditya Birla launched Abof.com and Reliance also entered the fashion category with Ajio.com.

‘Phygital’ KRS Jamwal, Executive Director of Tata Industries, told BusinessLine that the group has been working on developing this portal for the past one-and-a-half years.

“Google was not the first search engine to start operations, but it ended up becoming the most popular because of its differentiated algorithm. Similarly, we intend to be the most popular e-commerce platform in the next five years,” Jamwal said and added that ‘phygital’ (combination of physical and digital) is the way forward.

The technology for TataCLiQ has been developed by Tata’s marquee IT company TCS. It was built by drawing synergies from other Tata group companies, Jamwal said.

At present, the website focuses on apparels, electronics and footwear. The salt-to-software conglomerate is planning to convert all its retail stores (Westside, Croma, Tanishq) for a digital experience going forward as it plans to add other categories such as jewellery, furnishings, furniture and grocery in the coming months.

With deep pockets and a strong retail presence, TataCLiQ will use its stores and that of other brands as delivery centres or mini warehouses. It already has over 2 lakh stock-keeping units across 400 brands. TataCLiQ will deliver to customers across 7,000 pin codes, where already players such as Amazon, Flipkart and Snapdeal have a major presence.

Ashutosh Pandey, CEO of Tata Unistore, and the man driving TataCLiQ, said TataCLiQ will deal directly with the brands, thus differentiating itself from open marketplaces such as Flipkart and Amazon.

“We are not planning to onboard SMEs, just strong brands.”

‘Plugging gaps’ The company is not planning to invest heavily on acquiring customers but focus on customer experience.

“Currently there are only 30 million regular online shoppers in India and there is immense potential to bring the next 100 million with an offering that builds from their current path to purchase rather than expecting them to change behaviour.

“TataCLiQ.com aims to achieve this by plugging need gaps through ‘phygital’ services,” Pandey added.

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