Meesho loses business and friends when Meesho goes direct in 2022.

Currently headquartered in Surat, Pooja is a Meesho reseller who has been in the business since 2018. She uses the app to purchase unbranded apparel for women and children from wholesalers, and then she sells the clothing to her friends and relatives via WhatsApp.

Pooja had established a substantial customer base, processing at least 40 transactions every day and earning around Rs 60,000 per month. In 2019, she received the “emerging reseller” award, which she much appreciated. In a great event held at a top hotel, she was one of 11 ladies from Gujarat who received the honour from Meesho, who was also there.

Pooja, 34, expressed her delight by telling Entrackr that she was “amazed and beyond thrilled.” She requested that she be referred to only by a pseudonym. I didn’t hear anything from Meesho for almost a year. When I answered the phone, they were pleased with my performance and informed me that they wanted to recognise my efforts with an award.

Pooja was now able to generate income on her own. However, the last six months have wholly undone all of her hard work over four years of her life.

She claims that after Meesho changed its business approach in 2021, she lost nearly all of her customers.

Whenever Pooja attempted to sell the same things at a reduced price, she mentioned her profit margins. People can now purchase the same items at a lesser cost through the Meesho app. Friends and family members are now enraged with her since she has refused to give them what they want. “Many individuals have inquired why I am charging a fee,” Pooja explained. I can’t since it was embarrassing, and I’m not emotionally prepared to face them at this time.

Entrackr conducted interviews with a dozen resellers from throughout India for this report. Although female Meesho salespeople who utilise family relationships to sell things to relatives are being accused of taking advantage of them, this is not true. Many of the folks who came to Pooja’s shop every week were regular clients, and Pooja claims that many of her relationships with them have ended badly, and she does not wish to see them again. On Meesho, Pooja received more than 1200 orders every month, but now she receives only eight or nine orders per month.

Facebook-backed, The Meesho social commerce platform was launched in 2015 and was available to the public. Autrey, the CEO of Meesho, has stated repeatedly that the company’s mission is to assist Indian women in becoming financially independent by providing them with the opportunity to create their enterprises with no money. “These are first-generation women entrepreneurs setting the path for the social commerce revolution,” Aatrey stated in 2020. “They are preparing the way for the social commerce revolution.”

This storey is believed by many people, including investors and the media. The vast majority of them are also resellers. However, in mid-2021, the corporation decided to transition to an e-commerce platform, going directly to the customers and acquiring the businesses of 15 million resellers, most of whom were women. This harmed their enterprises.

Women who sell Meesho items claim that the corporation has terminated their employment although they earn a consistent income for years. Right now, direct sales contribute 75 per cent of Meesho’s total sales revenues. Currently, they place less focus on resellers than in the past. In the words of Pooja, it appears that they are no longer concerned with our well-being.

She has been a reseller for Meesho since the app first appeared on the Google Play Store in 2011. Anita is a 48-year-old woman. As one of the family’s first smartphone owners, she set out to discover online opportunities to earn extra income. She found Meesho to accomplish her goal. She began by selling handicrafts and women’s clothing on the Meesho platform. She made a lot of money and even rose to be one of the most incredible Meesho vendors in the country.

She no longer purchases anything from Meesho because the quality of the things they get from their vast network of wholesalers has deteriorated significantly. “I believe Meesho added an excessive number of sellers during the lockdown,” stated Anita, who requested to be addressed only as Anita. It’s so horrible that I have to order for myself first before I can acquire it for my customer to avoid disappointment.

In contrast, the decision to cut links with her principal source of income became more firmly established after receiving calls from regular customers mocking her about where she worked and how much she charged.

The delivery person does not identify the package as being from me; instead, they identify it as Meesho. This has been going on for a year, and Anita explained that this had never happened before. I was surprised that several of my regular clients laughed when I told them that they had been purchasing directly from Meesho.” As soon as I saw that, I became distraught.

Fifty-seven million app downloads from August to October, according to Meesho, made the app the most downloaded in the world in October 2021. The numbers also demonstrate this:

It is believed that various concerns, ranging from scalability issues to quality control problems, are responsible for Meesho’s current course. ‘Their reseller business was preventing them from progressing much further.’ They were only allowed to sell a few unbranded things to customers, but they were not allowed to sell groceries or other branded products. The business model of Meesho, according to an analyst in the industry who is familiar with the company’s operations, was likewise overlapping, with resellers in the same geographic area selling to clients. “It didn’t work out as a business,” says the author.

Furthermore, according to insiders, Meesho intends to increase its direct sales from 75 per cent of total sales to 97 per cent of total sales during the next two years. People still dislike Meta, although it has emerged as a leader in the social commerce area and has received funding from major corporations such as Naspers (now Proses) and Facebook (now Meta).

Meesho ruled the “market,” according to a former Forrester analyst, who stated that “Flipkart and Amazon dominated eCommerce about 6 or 7 years ago.” He added that “they needed to construct a distinct narrative for Meesho to acquire money in that circumstance.” During this period, social commerce saw explosive growth in the Chinese market, making social interaction appear to be a good storey to sell.

Meesho received a lengthy questionnaire from Entrackr. As stated by a representative for Meesho, “We were the first company in India to implement the reseller model on a significant scale. We continue to reach many people in India (about 400 million) who are online but do not purchase products directly from us. We have over 15 million self-employed individuals (resellers).

They claim that most of their vendors are women who are looking to supplement their family’s income. According to estimates from sources outside the company, we control 95 per cent of the internet reseller marketplace. As the platform’s selection has grown, the gross merchandise value (GMV) for these resellers has doubled in the last year.

In India, many e-commerce startups have attempted to emulate Meesho’s social commerce strategy. They have built an app to assist them in selling their merchandise. Because of their activities, they have been obliged to begin selling directly to customers. However, they were unable to get the fundamental components of the reseller model correct.

The resellers Entrackr talked to are adjusting to the adjustments for the time being. Many users have ceased posting product photographs from Meesho’s catalogue since they have observed that customers utilise the “search by image” option on the Meesho app and purchase directly from Meesho due to their observations. Pooja has now begun to establish ties with manufacturers in her city by meeting with them in person for the first time.

While she made far more money initially, Meesho’s friends and family don’t seem to mind that she is now earning less. As far as she knows, she exclusively shares images of products from a local manufacturer with the few consumers who still frequent her establishment. Meesho is the only programme I use, and I don’t use it for business purposes.

Many people have said that the large e-commerce corporations have acted excessively greedy manner. However, Meesho has gone much further than that, offering the same products at a lesser price straight to its resellers’ customers, a practice known as direct marketing. They study the shopping habits of their target clients before launching their brands in the most appropriate locations. As a result of the lack of cooperation among its resellers, this may have been a compelling case of market power abuse.

edited and proofread  by nikita sharma