Why E- Retailers like Amazon & Others Are Wooing Kirana Stores?


BENGALURU: Kirana stores, what makes these small shops stand out from the fancy e-commerce stores like Amazon or BigBasket? Well in our beloved kirana stores in the neighborhood, we always have the freedom to take instant credit—‘Bhaiya, will pay you tomorrow,’ so you see the point? Therefore no matter how vast the E-commerce industry is, the humble kirana stores will always remain their seniors. Now the time has come where the e-retailers look towards grocery stores for a lending hand.

ET reports that E-commerce retailers like Amazon, Reliance Retail, Big Basket, among others are eagerly waiting for a nod from grocery stores to be their delivery points, calling it a ‘fruitful’ partnership. Amazon already has few kiranas as its sellers, who deliver Amazon’s products to the customers in that neighborhood. Others like Big Basket want kiranas to sell its private labels and Reliance Retail is looking for tie-ups with them to reach better to the consumers.

Now, the point is how many of those grocers would give in to the e-retailers, because the catch is the latter who needs the help of the former. Here we have Gopichand, a grocer in Mumbai’s Borivali, who out rightly rejected partnerships with Amazon saying that his business is going well and that he doesn’t need external support.

This is just one among the strategies followed by e-tailors today. To cope up with the competition, e-com sites are scaling up methods like catering to specific cities or specific localities. The delivery point idea is supposed to simplify the ‘last-mile’ distribution by using kirana stores as a channel. This is why everybody seems to be wooing the kiranas.

The catch is this method involves lesser investment. And Hello grocery is not an easy business in India!

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