Online Food & Grocery Retail Outlets In India Rising: USDA

NEW DELHI: The number of online food and grocery retail outlets has increased to 44 so far this year from 14 in 2013 on the back of growing Internet users in the country, a latest USDA report said.

Online retailers are competing with kirana stores that provide quick (often within an hour) home delivery and credit to neighbourhood consumers. Compared to these stores, online retailers will need to overcome delivery challenges, it said.

Maximum of these online grocery retail outlets are operating in Delhi, followed by Bangalore, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, Kolkata, Chandigarh, Trivandrum and Coimbatore and others.

"Online food and grocery retailing outlets have increased from 14 in 2013 to 44 as of September 2014. Growth in online retail use has been greatest among younger and professional population segments," the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) said in its latest report.

The number of online grocery retail outlets is expected to rise in future with total Internet users increasing from 120 million to 213 million in the past year as well as a fall in mobile handset prices and a rise in smartphone penetration, it said.