Reliance’s JioMart Expanded its Services to Compete in E-Grocery Market
The people of India and the rest of the world are familiar with Reliance Industries at this point. Reliance Industries is based in Mumbai and was established in May 1973.
After Reliance Industries acquired most of Infotel Broadband Services Limited, it was a historic move to form Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited (IBSL). Due to this, Reliance’s telecommunications division experienced unprecedented growth.
JioMart was created due to the merger between Reliance Industries and Jio Platforms, the parent company of Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited, also known as Jio.
The JioMart services were first soft-launched in December 2019 before being available in April 2020 in Thane, Navi Mumbai, and Kalyan. After it was fully launched in May 2020, these services were subsequently extended to over 200 locations across the nation.
Mukesh Ambani’s most recent business venture offers grocery delivery right to your home in light of the devastating coronavirus outbreak. Since it was founded, it has continuously assisted users in locating groceries and various other items from multiple categories, such as clothing, household goods, leisure items, and more.
In India, Amazon, Flipkart, and Big Basket are just a few of the well-known grocery delivery services that JioMart currently competes with.
JioMart, Reliance Jio’s online store, is now accepting orders from customers in major cities and towns like Mysuru, Visakhapatnam, Coimbatore, Dehradun, and Bhatinda.
As it continues to add local kiranas to its platform and fulfil orders through its Reliance Fresh and Smart stores, JioMart is currently increasing its sales. Additionally, it has open delivery centres in places where orders placed through kiranas cannot be filled.
JioMart – Desh ki Nayi Dukan
JioMart offers a wide selection of goods, including packaged food, fruits, vegetables, groceries, bakery items, beverages, and more. JioMart can be found online at jiomart.com.
This platform is powered by Reliance Jio and Reliance Retail and works with local shops, big-box stores, wholesalers, and internet retailers. The business incorporated JioMart with its registered customer database from Reliance Fresh, Reliance Smart, and other retail companies.
JioMart said the following in a statement-
“We provide you with the ease of shopping for all your household essentials in one place, including fresh fruits and vegetables, rice, dals, oil, packaged food, dairy goods, frozen food, pet food, household cleaning supplies, and personal care items. Never waste a crisis, they say,” Damodar Mall, the chief executive of food retail at Reliance Retail, wrote on Twitter. JioMart delivers in over 200 communities, no matter how big or little. During the 2003 SARS outbreak, Chinese e-commerce behemoth Alibaba (BABA) “flourished” In these trying times, we look for similar chances to meet the standards.
JioMart – Industry
JioMart is a part of the online grocery and food sector. This sector grew at a CAGR of 71.2 per cent from 2013 to 2018 and is projected to expand at a CAGR of 45.5 per cent from 2018 to 2023.
JioMart – Growth
JioMart has unquestionably been a successful pilot and has expanded significantly over the past few years. JioMart’s most notable growth indicators include:
- JioMart witnessed a 3 times increase in its merchant base in its grocery delivery vertical in the Q4 FY2021.
- During the same fiscal year, it increased service to 10 new cities.
- JioMart is quite popular in Tier 3 cities and beyond.
- The company’s order frequencies have increased by 3X.
- Over 300,000 merchants, including kiranas and small retailers, have joined JioMart.
- It served more than 1 million clients as of January 26, 2021.
- JioMart is still expanding. It increased its product selection by three times, its order frequency by five times, and the average basket value by twenty per cent.
- The eCommerce platform witnessed an 80% repeat order growth in Q4 FY2021
- JioMart is also available on WhatsApp, where users can place orders for groceries and other necessities.
JioMart Express
JioMart has introduced JioMart Express in anticipation of entering the well-liked fast commerce market in June 2022. The platform was tested in Navi Mumbai and now offers more than 3K SKUs, including food, home, and personal care items.
Even though it’s unclear how JioMart’s quick commerce division works right now—some reports say it uses Dunzo’s delivery service and neighbourhood Kirana stores as hyperlocal hubs, while others say Reliance Retail stores—the company is quickly gaining traction.
By the end of the upcoming fiscal year, JioMart Express hopes to offer its services in 200+ additional cities. Soon, this joint venture between Reliance Retail and Jio will sell small electronics, including smartphones and medications.
Benefits of JioMart Express
With companies like Zepto, Blinkit, Dunzo, Swiggy, Instamart, and others, quick commerce delivery is quickly becoming popular. As a result, many players from different industries entered the market, eventually reaching Reliance, which is already well-known across many industries. JioMart Express finally debuted as a result of this. JioMart’s rapid commerce division will undoubtedly benefit users in various ways. Let’s look at the benefits of JioMart Express:
- Express 90 minutes delivery
- 3000+ grocery and essentials
- No minimum order value
- Numerous discount coupons and other options
- Quality of Reliance
- Redemption of points
- Flexible online payments
JioMart – Partnerships
On April 22, 2020, Facebook Inc. (now known as Meta) paid $5.7 billion (Rs 43,574 crore) for a 9.99 per cent share in Jio Platforms, the digital division of Reliance Industries. Utilising the 400 million strong WhatsApp user base in India, this cooperation assisted Reliance in rolling out its service for India’s small enterprises and grocery stores. Three days following the agreement, JioMart launched its service over WhatsApp.
JioMart primarily collaborates with a sizable number of neighbourhood Kirana shops, which aids in the platform’s expansion. It has also linked with many UPI systems to make the payment process simple for the clients.
On August 3, 2022, ePayLater and JioMart entered a partnership that will enable the platform to provide lines of credit to its B2B clients. This is the last partnership that JioMart saw.
JioMart – Logo and Tagline
Mukesh Ambani, the CEO of Reliance, mentioned JioMart and remarked, “Customer aapka, Help humara,” which suggests that JioMart will give local merchants and Kirana owners a tonne of support.
JioMart – Business and Revenue Model
The business concept used by JioMart is called O2O (offline to offline). Local merchants and kiranas will use JioMart to receive online orders, which will be delivered in accordance with the most recent delivery windows. The JioMart business model unites the three parties—producers, consumers, and kiranas—on a single platform.
Owners of Kiranas should register first. After registering for JioMart Kirana, JioMart will assist those Kirana stores in going digital so that they may accept orders over WhatsApp. A confirmation message is issued to the user to pick up the item from the store after the Kirana retailers have placed the order.
JioMart’s business strategy is centred on giving customers an omnichannel experience.
How to Use JioMart?
Both the Apple App Store and Google Play Store offer the JioMart app. Both a desktop and mobile version of JioMart are now accessible. The Facebook-owned instant messaging service WhatsApp can also be used to access JioMart’s services.
You must input your pin code in the “Delivering to” form on the website to see if JioMart’s service is available where you are. If you see a green light, the service is available where you are. Otherwise, a message in red appears, “We are currently unavailable at this location. Stay tuned!”
The most helpful aspect of this website is the “search with list” option. Instead of looking for each item individually, you can copy and paste or enter the complete product list in this part. The website will conduct a sequential search for the products on your behalf. You must add your selection to the cart.
On jiomart.com, one must sign in to place an order. A little shipping fee of 25 will be imposed if the order value is less than 750. JioMart provides free delivery on orders over 750. The customer has two payment options: online and offline.
JioMart – Payment and Delivery Options
Jio has integrated many payment methods on the website, including e-wallets and UPI. The business has practically every type of payment method available. There is also support for many e-wallets, including Paytm, PhonePe, JioMoney, Google Pay, and MobiKwik. Along with the features of credit and debit cards, the website offers a net banking alternative. Cash on delivery is an alternative to shopping online (COD).
The fact that JioMart does not offer same-day delivery is one of the factors that customers may find inconvenient. Usually, it takes two days to deliver the orders. Delivery times may occasionally be prolonged if a lockdown occurs or comparable restrictions are put in place. However, JioMart Express, the rapid commerce division of JioMart, would be able to resolve this.
Changes to the search procedure are just one example of what has to be improved. The issue is that a specific product’s name may alter depending on the local language, making it difficult to find that product. Such differences need to be picked up by the search algorithm. Otherwise, the website will be unable to satisfy the needs of many users.
How will JioMart impact competitors?
As part of its “Desh ki Nayi Dukan” marketing campaign, JioMart provides free express grocery delivery from a nearby supermarket or Kirana stores. The debut of JioMart coincides with a rise in coronavirus incidence in India. Officials have stated that JioMart’s online product inventory will be increased after the lockdown limitations are released. Then JioMart will operate at maximum efficiency.
Without a doubt, JioMart is a fierce rival to other online grocers like BigBasket and Grofers (now Blinkit). On its website, JioMart sells products in various categories, including fresh food, pet food, packaged food, household cleaning supplies, and pulses. The company is prepared to compete with established brands like BigBasket, Blinkit, Amazon Fresh and Pantry, and Flipkart’s Supermart.
Flipkart, which is owned by Walmart (WMT) and Amazon (AMZN), are the two most important e-commerce platforms in India. Both businesses are active in numerous cities around the nation. They supply products, including apparel, electronics, and smartphones. Last year, both companies began offering online grocery deliveries. Because Amazon and Flipkart are weak in the grocery market, they are concerned about JioMart’s launch.
The growth of JioMart also occurs as the coronavirus pandemic-related lockdown continues to affect millions of Indians. During the Covid-19 outbreak, Amazon and Flipkart also had trouble fulfilling orders in India. This is brought on by the limitations placed on moving between cities. Due to the lockdown, the corporation had to expedite expansion plans with increased warehouse capacity.
Flipkart momentarily curtailed operations due to the lockdown imposed in India, while Amazon had to restrict orders due to the surge in demand. Despite the many difficulties and obstacles posed by zonal limitations and supply chain disruption, Flipkart and other e-commerce businesses have struggled to offer necessities while considering their employees’ safety. It will present a strong challenge to regional rivals who also place significant bets on grocery for their expansion.
JioMart – Shaping the Future of India
70% of the Indian retail industry, according to investment research firm Bernstein, is made up of groceries. Kirana retailers dominate the market, which is more than 90% unorganised. According to Bernstein, the global retail sector is projected to grow from $676 billion in 2018 to close to $1.3 trillion by 2025.
Forrester estimates that India’s $3 billion online grocery sector is very minor in contrast. However, the company claims that the number is quickly increasing as the pandemic alters people’s shopping preferences. With the intention of connecting three crore kiranas or food stores with nearby consumers online, JioMart was introduced in December of last year.
Reliance is actively raising money through Jio Platforms, which also comprises the telecom company Jio Infocomm. In just one month, it has raised a staggering $10 billion from investors such as Facebook, KKR, and General Atlantic. JioMart offers $7 billion worth of stock (around Rs. 53,000 crores).
According to analysts at Bernstein and Forrester, JioMart is ideally positioned to upend the online grocery business because it can acquire supplies from Reliance’s physical stores. India’s largest retailer is Reliance. JioMart will have a hyper-local supply and logistics network that may be used to meet the demand if it is successful in getting kiranas online and organised.
Conclusion
There are rivalries everywhere. Companies must continually advance, offer better options, address issues, and thrive to outperform rivals to survive in the market.
The platform is unquestionably one of Reliance’s most innovative strategies. It has already benefited many people around the nation who now have access to most of anything they could ever want, including groceries and necessities. For the owners of Kiranas, JioMart is a blessing in disguise.
Over 300,000 Kirana stores and local vendors/merchants have already signed up with Reliance’s JioMart, and the company plans to expand the number across India swiftly. Later, the business intends to turn these stores into JioMart franchises so that customers may purchase goods directly from Reliance Retail and have a digital shopping experience. The neighbourhood Kirana stores can complete all orders.
edited and proofread by nikita sharma
