Paytm Mall, owned by Paytm Ecommerce Private Limited, today announced that it will partner with over 10,000 Kirana stores, small shops, and businesses for hyperlocal deliveries, as per the company's official release.

The company said that it has been investing in scaling its hyperlocal operations over the last few weeks and is now offering delivery of grocery essentials in more than 100 cities across the country. Paytm plans to scale it to more cities within the next few weeks.

Paytm said that it has launched several initiatives to help stressed businesses including its merchant partners, small shop owners, SMEs during the Covid-19 pandemic crisis.

Paytm claimed that it has digitally-enabled small businesses and helped them sell their products on Paytm Mall. Paytm said that it has given the stores all the necessary logistics support. The company hopes to help shops and stores which have either witnessed a sharp decline in footfall or had to abruptly pause operations due to the lockdown.

Many of the stores, while they have the inventory, are running short on the workforce as many of their employees have returned to their hometowns. Paytm Mall said it is connecting the offline stores with their logistics partners so that they can deliver to their customers and keep their businesses running. The company said that grocery store owners are witnessing almost 50 per cent additional orders per day.

Srinivas Mothey, Senior Vice President, Paytm Mall stated in the official release: "Paytm Mall has always advocated a 100 per cent marketplace model of operation against an inventory led one as pursued by other major players. Our objective is to connect neighborhood offline stores to interested customers far and wide through our e-commerce platform.”

He added: “We are constantly reaching out to smaller sellers to understand the challenges they are facing in stocking inventory as well as the delivery of goods. During this time of crisis, we want to ensure that our merchant partners do not lose out on business. Our tie-ups with small businesses would ensure that service our customers faster and hyper-locally."

Currently, all leading logistics players including GATI, Ecom Express, Delhivery, Bluedart, FedEx, and others are working with Paytm Mall. The company said that as more fulfillment and delivery executives of logistics partners join back to work, more orders would be eligible for same-day delivery.

According to the company, there has been a massive uptick in the sales in grocery essentials from Tier-II and Tier-III towns as over 200 such cities are ordering the most on Paytm Mall. Cities Including Indore, Ahmedabad, NCR, Bengaluru, Lucknow, Pune, Chennai, Ludhiana, Bathinda, have all seen a rise in orders.

Paytm Mall mentioned that it has decided to help its merchant partners who are facing issues with stocking up on inventory and fulfillment of orders by waiving off service level agreement (SLA) and devised Hygiene SOPs for them and their workplace/employees. It has partnered with several suppliers and brands of FMCG goods to help its merchant partners stock up.

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