Liquor app BevQ pips food delivery platforms in Kerala

The BevQ App, a mobile phone application for liquor sales during the Covid-lockdown period in Kerala, seems to have pipped the food delivery apps to become the most popular and trending app on the Google Playstore.

BevQ has witnessed as many as 35 lakh downloads in just eight months of its inception, MGK Vishnu, CEO of the Kochi-based FairCode Technologies that developed the app, told BusinessLine. The app had started operations on May 28 last year when the Centre had eased the lockdown restrictions by lifting the ban on liquor sales in the country.

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The idea of developing the app was aimed at curbing the overcrowding of tipplers at liquor outlets during the Covid times and allotting them a specific time to buy liquor from their nearby outlets, he said.

After going live on Google Play store, BevQ had crossed one lakh downloads within just a few hours. In the first month, Vishnu said that 67.75 lakh tokens were issued in response to the online orders with an average 1.8 lakh tokens a single day. The figure would occasionally go up to 3.70 lakh on days of peak demand.

Meanwhile, the Kerala State Beverages Corporation, which has the monopoly for liquor sales in the State, has decided to discontinue the BevQ app since, according to officials, the app has served its purpose and become redundant. Besides, the online ordering and sales had created some hassles in the dispensing of liquor across time and geography.

However, Faircode Technologies has submitted a new proposal to the government in the post-Covid situation that ensures a customer who uses the BevQ app a slot in the queue in front of outlets during peak demand and its delivery through authorised counters.

Vishnu said that a reservation fee can be collected for such bookings that would fetch additional revenue for the Beverages Corporation. It is to be noted that Kerala has one of the largest per capita consumption in the country with sales of ₹14,504 crore in the pre-pandemic financial year.