Empowering sports on Playgroundonline Date:   Sunday , November 01, 2009 It was a case of low hanging fruit. With a crowd of crazy sports fans and ‘self-acclaimed’ sports pundits in our nation, there was not a single portal dedicated to buying sports goods and accessories in India. It struck the impulse of two friends RK Kalluri and Srini Battula who came up with the portal www.playgroundonline.com to bring in value to the sporting fraternity. Information on sports goods was unavailable and earlier it was difficult to distinguish between the good and the bad. “Our company will bridge this gap,” says Battula. Playgroundonline.com is an e-store that allows its users to order 24 hours a day at the best prices, with the convenience of the top sports brands being home delivered to them at any location in the country. To glorify sport by making it accessible and affordable to people across the country, an IIT-Madras graduate “RK” and 15 year veteran of software product development Battula founded the company Playgroundonline in 2007.Company launched its portal in early 2008 with self funded investments. Bringing the buyers and sellers closer, the Bangalore-based startup Playgroundonline.com offers sports goods, apparel, footwear, fitness accessories, fan merchandise and more. The website boasts of 60+ top brands including Adidas, Nike, MRF, Taylormade, Wilson, Stag and Speedo. Each product is shown with MRP, with the website’s exclusive price and discount if applied. Other features include sharing specific information with friends via social media channels, product reviews, product comparison, sports facility/coaches guide, brand stores and mobile payment. The portal covers all sports including cricket, tennis, table tennis, badminton, squash, swimming, skating, golf, indoor games, camping, basketball, football and more. The apparel shows items and merchandise related to popular sell-outs like IPL gear. The junior sections are for toys and games of various genre and Junior sporting goods (cricket and badminton kits, racquets etc.) catering to different age groups. Besides the portal being well setup, the company also claims that it features a cool design layout backed by .NET platform and secure/scalable infrastructure. In a giant leap to the field of e-commerce, Battula, a Co-Founder of Playgroundonline.com says, “We want to be at the forefront of e-commerce in India through our product/service parameters, and offerings.” Attracting sports enthusiasts all over the nation, the website has already achieved about 15000 page views a month. It stands out among its competitors with its uniqueness in providing branded authentic products and specialized content related to sports and fitness on a single online platform for the first time in India. “We differentiate ourselves through wide product range, integrated logistics, technology leverage and superior customer service,” affirms Battula. As a part of its product strategy, the company is planning to build more interactivity in the community of sports lovers, by providing an arena for users to interact and express opinions. With the advent of explosive internet penetration coupled with ever increasing awareness on health and fitness, the company believes that there is an immense opportunity for them. However, establishing a convincing position in the market with such a robust website to help consumers is not an easy task. What accentuates the challenge for Playgroundonline is to create awareness among people about the niche Web-based market place for sports. But, the team managed to win over its consumers by engineering the website in a manner which is far more responsible and empathetic towards their consumers. Its founders reckon that e-commerce has a greater role to play in tier-2 cities due to factors like money available, aspirations of people and access to quality branded goods in these places. Growing ahead in the market, from being a shopping site, the company is planning to expand by improving content and creating an online sports community. It has well laid out future plans to reach out to several schools and corporates, and provide a comprehensive sports platform. It has plans to offer its e-commerce technology platform to other businesses in the country. For gaining this kind of scale and building pan India presence, Playgroundonline is currently looking to infuse capital into the company through external/strategic investors. Pioneering developments in the sports space, Playgroundonline is not only fulfilling its vision to empower sports but is also heralding a new age in the e-commerce sector.