After price war, it is now the rush for fastest delivery in the $3-billion ecommerce market in India.
Online marketplace Snapdeal claims to deliver goods in “just two hours”. This, the company plans to achieve by setting up 40 fulfilment centres across 15 cities.
Taking on rivalsSnapdeal, which raised $100 million recently, plans to take on players such as Amazon and Flipkart, which have already announced same-day delivery in the major cities. However, Snapdeal plans to extend this service called ‘Snapdeal Plus’ to 30 cities within this year.
Rohit Bansal, co-Founder & COO, Snapdeal.com said, “Our vision is to partner with 100,000 sellers in the next 12 months and to create an ecosystem that allows businesses to sell online.”
The Indian retail sector primarily comprises small and medium-size businesses that often do not have the necessary infrastructure, resources and know-how to process and ship products directly to customers. The company, founded by Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal, hopes that over 75 per cent of the orders getting fulfilled through this service.
“The move will enable businesses especially small and medium-size businesses to sell products on the marketplace platform to over 25 million Snapdeal members across 5,000-plus towns and cities in the country,” he added.
Analytics reportThe service allows sellers to stock their inventory at the nearest Snapdeal Fulfilment Centre where the orders, once placed by customers, will be shipped in less than two hours.
Sellers are also provided with analytics and reports based on their past sales, which will enable them to predict the level of inventory which they need to maintain at the fulfilment centres. However, industry experts are of the view that the ecommerce companies have to burn a lot of cash in a bid to fulfil product delivery in such a short time as they have to invest heavily on warehouses even in smaller cities. According to them, one-day shipping can cost four times more than the amount of standard shipping of six-seven days.