Proforma Cover Sheet

Topic #: 4

Students Name :- Saurabh Sudhir Girgune

Roll No :- 08

Heading :- #4 Which of the current „start-ups‟ (in India) in e-retail/commerce domain are truly
world class? Support your choice with desk-researched information, data and bench-marking.

INDEX

Sr.no Topics Page nos

01 About Big Basket 02

02 Big Basket Overview 02

03 Business Model 05

04 Current Scenario 07

05 Comparison with competitors 07

06 SWOT Analysis 08

07 Benchmark set by Bigbasket 11

Bibliography 12

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 01. About Big Basket

BigBasket.com with 18000+ products and 1000+ brands listed on their catalogue is
known to be India’s largest online food and grocery store. It offers a wide range of
options in every category to deliver you with the best quality products at the lowest rates
including fresh fruits and vegetables, spices and seasonings, a category of packaged
products, beverages, personal care products, even meats, and many more. Choose
from a wide range of options in every category, exclusively handpicked to help you find
the best quality available at the lowest prices. Select a time slot for delivery and your
order will be delivered right to your doorstep, anywhere in Bangalore, Hyderabad,
Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Delhi, Noida, Mysore, Coimbatore, Vijayawada-Guntur,
Kolkata, Ahmedabad-Gandhinagar, Lucknow-Kanpur, Gurgaon, Vadodara,
Visakhapatnam, Surat, Nagpur, Patna, Indore and Chandigarh Tricity You can pay
online using your debit / credit card or by cash / sodexo on delivery.
We guarantee on time delivery, and the best quality! As of now, BigBasket is a purely
internet based company and does not have any brick and mortar stores.

02. Big Basket Overview

Bigbasket.com is an online food and grocery store located in

Bangalore, Karnataka, India

Categories Delivery Service, E-Commerce, Retail, Shopping

Founded Date Oct 1, 2011

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Founders Abhinay Choudhari, Hari Menon, Vipul Parekh, VS Sudhakar

Operating Status Active

Last Funding Type Post-IPO Secondary

Number of Employees 1001-5000

Also Known As Supermarket Grocery Supplies Private Limited

Company Type For Profit

Website
bigbasket.com

Contact Email
customerservice@bigbasket.com
Phone Number
1(860) 123-1000

At Bigbasket.com they believe in being smart, quick & efficient making your life as
leisurely as possible. They understand that in this fast-paced world, time is always of
the essence and hence want to make your grocery shopping easy and convenient so
that no time is wasted in this process. So, no more hassle of going down to the grocery
store and long queues for billing etc. You can browse through their varied range of
products at bigbasket.com, order them and get them to be delivered at your own
convenient time slot.

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How BigBasket started?

It all started in 1999 when Hari Menon along with five of his friends- VS Sudhakar, Vipul
Parekh, Abhinay Choudhari and V S Ramesh launched their online retail website known
as ‘Fabmart’.

They failed to get some traction as their idea was way ahead of its time, so they could
not work for the masses.

That was the time when they all decided to put the online business on the backseat and
focus totally on ‘Fabmall’ with all their energy. Fabmall was their physical retail chain of
grocery stores. They too merged this chain with another grocery retail chain known as
‘Trinethra’.

Implementing many strategies and with hard work, in a matter of seven years, they
succeeded to expand their business to 200 stores across Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu,
Karnataka and Kerala. Around the same time, they also decided to sell-off the business
to Aditya Birla Group.

Then the time came when they start thinking of getting back to their original idea of
online grocery store. Discussion with serial entrepreneur Krishnan Ganesh was
successful and they concluded to go ahead with it. The idea was collectively seeded by
serial entrepreneurs and angel investors Krishnan and Meena Ganesh. And finally in
December 2011, they launched BigBasket.com

Funding Received

Soon after their launch, they received their first funding of $10million from ChrysCapital
co-founder Raj Kondur and Ascent Capital.

There were 15 funding rounds of more than $100 million in the whole year of 2014. So
far this year, BigBasket has raised $150 million in fresh round of funding led by UAE’s
Abraaj Group to expand its services into smaller cities. Existing investors Bessemer

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Venture Partners and Helion Advisors along with International Finance Corp and Sands
Capital also participated in the round.

03. Business Model

bigbasket.com (Innovative Retail Concepts Private Limited) is India’s largest online food
and grocery store. With over 18,000 products and over a 1000 brands in our catalogue
you will find everything you are looking for. Right from fresh Fruits and Vegetables, Rice
and Dals, Spices and Seasonings to Packaged products, Beverages, Personal care
products, Meats. BigBasket has effectively used unmatched customer service with large
variety of products using constant innovation using technology.

When BigBasket started its operations, it adopted the ‘just-in-time model’ – wherein not
only unpreserved good but every item was brought against an order. In other words,
they were purchased-to-order. In this model, the delivery boy directly picks up the item
from the retailer, and directly delivers it to the customer.

As the time passed and their business grew, they proceeded to an ‘inventory model’ for
most of their products, and BigBasket now buys products directly from suppliers like –
HUL, P&G, farmers, mills, etc. and then stocks these in their warehouses. And for the

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revenue generation, BigBasket adds a small margin to the cost price of the product
before vending them.But BigBasket also sources many of its products locally as well as
nationally. Some items like onions, oranges, apples, etc. are purchased nationally from
their major producing locations; while, many other items are sourced locally from
‘mandis’ (markets) or local farmers. This depends on the product and its
surrounding factors.

How to order???

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 04. Current Scenario

BigBasket has been implementing a Hyper-local strategy, wherein, it has joined hands
with more than 1,800 neighborhood grocery stores across India to deliver goods within
an hour.

Looking for the current scenario – BigBasket now processes almost 20,000 orders a
day, with the involvement of 2000 team members.

Earlier they had acquired a hyper-local delivery start-up ‘Delyver’, to further strengthen
its delivery service. Although, the company still functions as an independent firm, but
the co-founders of Delyver have also been included in the management team of
BigBasket.

This acquisition has helped BigBasket in their Express Delivery model, to delivery
groceries in one hour.

Moving on, around the mid of 2015, BigBasket also roped in Bollywood actor – ‘Shah
Rukh Khan’ as their brand ambassador, for an undisclosed sum; following which, they
also launched a high volume television, digital and print media campaign as well.

They are now operational in 20 cities which include six metros, and are in plan to
expand to 50 more tier two cities soon. They will also be opening 8 large warehouses in
metro cities.

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 05. Big Basket Comparision with competitors:-

06. SWOT Analysis of Big Basket:-

Strengths in the SWOT Analysis of Big Basket :

1. Product Range: Big Basket offers a huge range of products which stretches to
about 18000 products.
2. Exotic Range: It also offers exotic fruits, vegetables and imported groceries
which are not easily available in nearby retail outlets. This gives them an edge in
catering to customers who like buying such stuff.
3. Discounts: Big Basket offers huge discounts on various products. They also
have the product bundling technique to maximise sales and offering maximum
discounts to the customers. This makes them a lucrative option for customers to
buy.
4. Convenience: Big Basket offers an escape from the hassle of standing in the
queues of malls or going all the way to the retail stores. They give the products
right at the door step and offer multiple payment options. The on-time delivery
guarantee makes them a lucrative option, Customers, especially in big cities

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 where life is very fast and it is difficult to reach thThe customers, can shop at any
time of the day.
5. Target Group: They have selected their target customers very carefully and
have established a footing in the metropolitan and some tier-I cities. They
operate in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Delhi, Mysore,
Vadodara, Patna, Indore, Vijaywada, etc. They are currently operational in about
25 cities.
6. Low Fixed Cost business model: Most of the items that Big Basket offers are
perishable hence they depend on the retail stores they are coordinating with for
the products. This means they have no inventory cost and makes their business
model more profitable.

Weakness in the SWOT Analysis of Big Basket :

1. Delivery Time: Big Basket delivers the groceries the next day. Many retailers
have started the facility of home delivery to nearby societies and customers in
just few minutes to hours. So customers prefer this instead of waiting for 24
hours.
2. High Variable Cost: Cost of running many delivery guys, delivery trucks, storage
for perishable items, wastage during transportation makes the business run at a
high variable cost. They have to bleed more money and will take longer to break
even.
3. Minimum order quantity/price compulsion: Big Basket does not offer home-
delivery below a certain set order price limit. This means that customers would
be forced to add a product or two just to avail the service. This makes them lose
a customers.
4. Be at home: Customers have to be at home when Big Basket is about to deliver.
This means the customers have to plan according to the delivery time. If by some
means the order gets delayed customer gets angry and unhappy by the service.
On top of this they have to pay a little add on price for the home delivery.
5. Order Cancellations: They depend on stores that they have tied-up with to
provide them the items. If they do not have the items available they won’t be able

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 to deliver them. This sometimes tend in cancellation of orders. Out of stock
issues tend to make the customers unhappy and repetitive of such issues makes
the customers reluctant to reuse the service.

Opportunities in the SWOT Analysis of Big Basket :

1. Market: Indian retail market is valued at more than approx. $550 million and
grocery alone covers 60% of this share. Hence it’s a huge market with many
players to accommodate and customers to cater.
2. Grocery Growth: India is the 6th largest grocery market in the world. E-
commerce grocery market is growing with a year on year growth rate of 19%.
3. Expansion: Many cities are still not covered by these startups and Big Basket
can target them and gain the first movers advantage. They can expand to tier-2
cities and increase their market.
4. Cross selling and Value Packaging – Cross selling is a major advantage for
Big basket as it can sell multiple products by product bundling.

Threats in the SWOT Analysis of Big Basket :

1. Competition: It has small presence in terms of cities covered hence, it is getting

a huge competition from other startups like Grofers, PepperTap, Nature’s Basket,
Zop Now, Aaram Shop, Mera Grocer, etc.
2. Bigger Players: Bigger players in terms of financial backing and presence are
also entering this lucrative industry. Players like Amazon, Flipkart and Google
have also entered this industry. This may prove fatal for smaller players like Big
Basket to compete with them.
3. Smaller Players: Many other localized shops have picked up on this trend and
have started home delivery service to nearby customers thereby killing groups of
target customers across regions and cities.
4. Customer Retention: It is very difficult to retain customers. They would tend to
move with the service provider that offers the most discounts.

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07. Benchmark set by Bigbasket

 Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant, has led a $300 million funding round in
India’s online grocery start-up bigbasket.com. The Bengaluru-based bigbasket
said other investors, including Abraaj Capital, Sands Capital and International
Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, also participated
in the round.

 The online grocer managed a mega feat this month by crossing the 5 million
customer benchmark.

 When it comes to sales the e-grocery firm has seen more than 300 percent
growth over the course of the past year. On a monthly basis, growth is
continuous at a 10 percent rate.

 The firm said it planned to use the money to build farmer networks, expand
deeper into existing cities and become the most preferred employer for blue-
collar jobs. “The funds will be directed towards bettering our technological,
analytical, and infrastructural prowess, all of which will enable the company to
move up the curve

 The firm was currently partnering about 1,800 farmers throughout the country
and would increase the number to 3,000.

 Big basket, which operates in 30 cities in the country, said it closed the previous
fiscal year (2016-17) with 1,410 crore in revenue. The firm said it was clocking
₹200 crore in monthly run-rate. This was expected to increase to 300 crore in
August 2018 and ₹500 crore in March 2019, according to the company.

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 Big basket, signed a three-year e-procurement deal with SourceEzy
Technologies Pvt. Ltd, an e-procurement software and consulting firm here to
source over 100 crore in the next three years.

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