Quick Commerce Vs Ecommerce: The Race to Speed Up India’s Retail Market across All Categories

The bustling online retail market is witnessing a heated competition between quick commerce and ecommerce platforms, with both blurring the lines between their business models and entering into each others’ territories as a part of their expansion plans.

For instance, quick commerce platforms like Swiggy Instamart, Zepto and Blinkit were once known for delivering only groceries and essential in minutes, but today they have ventured into clothing, beauty, toys, gifts, and other segments. On the other hand, ecommerce giants like Amazon has plans to enter the q-commerce game, while Flipkart has already entered the space to delivery products in less than an hour.

This evolution has transformed the consumers’ shopping behaviour as they now expect every product --- from skincare and gifts to dairy products --- to be delivered within few minutes at their door step. Shoppers who prefer convenience turn out to be ultimate winners in this competition.

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Swiggy’s Ecommerce Move

Food and grocery delivery platform Swiggy which will go public on November 13, has recruited at least a dozen of senior executives from Flipkart and Amazon in the past few months to expand its business and diversify its revenue streams.

To name a few, the IPO-bound company has hired former Flipkart VP Shalabh Shrivastava as its SVP of Driver Organisation, former Flipkart SVP Amitesh Jha as Swiggy Instamart CEO, former Flipkart VP Hari Kumar G as Swiggy’s SVP and CBO for its Instamart segment.

Swiggy also hired former Performance Marketing Head of Amazon, Anirban Roy as its VP earlier this year. The company has roped in top executives with huge experience of ecommerce business models ahead of its IPO. It is testing the waters in India’s $70 billion ecommerce market and compete with established brands like Amazon, Flipkart, JioMart and others.

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Blinkit, Zepto Replicate Ecommerce Biz

It all started with the quick delivery of food, groceries, and other essential items in 2020. But the quick commerce giants like Blinkit and Zepto are venturing into ecommerce territory by adding various categories like fashion, beauty, electronics, toys, home appliances, kitchen products, and more. All these products are being delivered within few minutes at consumers’ doorsteps.

This strategy will strengthen the quick commerce platforms, giving a tough competition to ecommerce rivals Flipkart and Amazon as well as traditional kirana stores. Going beyond grocery and essential items require more muscle power to their logistics network and the availability of dark stores to store a large number of SKUs for faster last mile deliveries.

So far, Zepto and Blinkit have joined their hands with Lyra, Jockey, Mad Over Print, Pepe Jeans and other popular brands for apparel segment.

It is worth mentioning that the family office of Bollywood star Amitabh Bachchan and Motilal Oswal Financial Services chairman Raamdeo Agrawal have acquired a small stake in Swiggy by purchasing shared held by the company’s employees and early investors. The ET report added that Agrawal has also picked up a stake in Zepto through its $665 million funding round.

 Read More | From Groceries to Economics: Government Eyes Data from Zepto, Blinkit to Revise the Base Year for GDP Data

Amazon, Flipkart’s Quick Commerce Plans

Ecommerce giants like Amazon and Flipkart are entering the buzzing quick commerce space to snag a piece of the pie, while the existing players continue to strengthen their play with Swiggy going public tomorrow (November 13) and Zepto planning to raise another $310 million funds soon.

Amazon will reportedly launch its offerings on quick commerce platform in the first quarter of the next year, while Flipkart has already introduced its quick delivery service called ‘Minutes’ and plans to operate around 100 dark stores to boost its quick commerce offerings, as per ET reports.

The report also stated that Amazon is reportedly exploring the possibility of acquiring a stake in Swiggy Instamart.

As convenience becomes priority for consumers, especially in urban areas, both sectors are looking into different ways to meet growing demand for fast deliveries across all possible range of products.