There was a time when buying grocery meant walking up to the market or to a nearby store for getting all the stuff you need in your house. The vegetable market was dominated by the hawkers and other vendors in the area, and you had to buy your vegetables from them only. To get your cereals, rice, spices and other essential in the kitchen, you had to rely on the local retail store which used to sell these items. As time went by, shopping malls and big retail giants came into the picture where you can buy all your necessary items underneath one roof. But the requirement to move out of the house for getting those stuff still remained.
But with the emergence of email and e-commerce shopping, the scenario of the grocery also changed. Now you can even order every kind of fruits, vegetables, juices and your daily rice, wheat and other kitchen essentials through these online grocery stores. These e-grocery stores have sort of revolutionized the small retail market. In short span of time online grocery portals such as BigBasket, Sasta-Sundar, Grofers, Reliance Fresh, Nature’s Basket and Aramshop are now delivering your daily needs at your doorstep.
With their mobile applications, selecting and ordering the goods is very convenient. You can order your entire month’s grocery in a single go and these e-grocery stores also offers attractive discount offers on purchases. Apart from that, it also ends the hassle of stepping out of the house for buying your daily grocery needs as the goods are delivered in a short time to your home.
The competition in this segment has also grown a lot as many big branded players have also launched their own e-grocery stores which is making the fight tougher. These online retail stores have also considerably boosted the FMCG market, and it holds around 60% of the total market value. Though the genesis of this e-retail market lies in the west, but with rapid urbanization and faster internet connectivity, it is quickly picking up the pace in India as well. The reason behind the growth of these e-groceries growth is their maximum storage capacity and providing multiple choices of goods underneath one portal. While the normal grocery shop can hold a limited amount of stock, these portals don’t have that problem, and it can serve multiple customers with huge volume of orders.
Business analysts see a big potential in the e-groceries market as its estimated value at current stage stands between $400 to $500 billion, and it will cross $700 billion by 2022. Since fruits and vegetables are daily needs of every household and Indian middle-class families are also becoming conscious about brands and hygiene of the products, it set that the e-grocery market will continue to grow at a good pace. Apart from that, the emergence of e-wallets has made the payment easier with their cash back offer, which is drawing more and more customers towards the use of e-grocery stores.
