Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart has announced the launch of its online grocery store called Flipkart Supermart. Flipkart’s new venture will be aimed at countering its rivals Amazon, Softbank-backed Grofers, and Alibaba-backed BigBasket.
Flipkart Supermart is currently operational in Bengaluru with plans of expanding its operations to Hyderabad, Chennai, and Delhi by the end of this year. Flipkart Supermart already had a soft launch in Bengaluru last year, grocery transactions make up around 25-30% of overall Flipkart transactions in the city.
According to people familiar with the development, the company is looking to invest ₹1,812 crores ($264 million) over the next three years in its grocery vertical.
Manish Kumar, head of groceries at Flipkart, said, “Grocery shopping is a mundane chore in any home, despite its outsized impact on a household’s budget. And it remains an unsolved e-commerce market, despite its importance to consumers and to the economy. With Flipkart Supermart we have solved for problems of assured quality, savings, and convenience to create an unmatched offering. We’re now taking it wider and plan to expand our reach and scale rapidly over the coming months.”
Flipkart will be looking to dominate the market share in the grocery domain by luring customers with discounts, seamless delivery, and shopping experience.
Online grocery is a highly competitive domain as Flipkart competes with some of the established players in the market. According to a March 2017 report by Kalagato, BigBasket held a large chunk of the market with a 35% market share in the online grocery sector in India, followed by Grofers with 31.5%, and Amazon taking 31.2% of the market.
While Flipkart is a late entrant in the online grocery sector, it will be cashing in on its large customer base, and with the backing of the US-retail giant Walmart, Flipkart is equipped to give the established players a tough fight.