admin
September 5, 2025
Shalinee Mishra, Exchange4Media
5 September 2025
Retailers in India are waking up to a hard truth: customer acquisition can no longer ride on advertising alone. Digital ad spends grew by 14-17% in 2024, touching nearly ₹50,000 crore (as per Pitch Madison report) and accounting for 46% of India’s total ad market. But with customer acquisition costs (CAC) rising 30-35% year-on-year and consumer attention fragmented across platforms, the ad-first growth engine is showing strain. What is emerging instead is an ecosystem where content in the form of video, celebrity-led storytelling, or creator-driven engagement is becoming the direct funnel to commerce.
Flipkart for instance is building influencer production hubs and embedding shoppable videos, Myntra has rolled out its video-first Glamstream, and Amazon has long blurred the line between streaming and shopping through Prime Video and Fire TV. From short videos to celebrity gossip, from beauty blogs to shoppable livestreams, e-commerce giants are no longer just marketplaces; they are evolving into media houses and the trend is only growing.
According to Mindshare’s latest Content Trend Report, India’s branded content marketing industry is now worth ₹10,000 crore, growing at nearly 20% annually, with video formats making up almost half of all spends.
India already has over 270 million online shoppers, a number that Bain projects will rise to 350 million by 2027, making it the world’s second largest e-retail user base. That scale is creating fertile ground for shoppable video and live commerce to take off.
Globally, branded content spend is projected to cross $500 bn by 2027. As per PwC estimates, India’s share is still <2% but among the fastest growing.
Video commerce today largely follows two prominent models. The first is driven by social platforms such as YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook, where shoppable posts allow users to move directly from content to purchase. The second is led by e-commerce platforms like Amazon, Myntra, Nykaa, and Flipkart and others which have added video sections to create immersive shopping experiences within their apps.
Within this, live commerce has emerged as a high-potential format. Meesho and Flipkart, for example, are leading the charge with 2-3% conversion rates, generating an estimated $150-200 million in GMV during festive 2024. Events like Flipkart’s Big Billion Days show how timed livestreams can capture active, purchase-ready audiences.
Meanwhile, influencer-led short videos are driving conversion rates as high as 63%, with beauty and personal care (BPC) and food & beverages (F&B) among the top categories benefiting from this shift. Redseer projects India’s live commerce market could touch $4-5 bn GMV by 2027, up from less than $300 mn today. This surge in shoppable video and live commerce is only the surface of a deeper structural change, one where content itself is becoming the moat that protects brands from rising ad costs, fragmented attention, and fickle consumer loyalty.
Beyond ads: Why content has become retail’s strongest defence
Chirag Taneja, co-founder of e-commerce enablement company GoKwik, framed the trend as a fundamental shift in ownership.
“It’s not just about enhancing top-of-funnel reach, it’s about owning demand, connection, and the touchpoint with end shoppers. For years, brands relied on ads to bring traffic. But acquisition costs have been rising, attention is fragmented, and privacy shifts have made targeting difficult. That’s why content is now the moat. When companies acquire content firms, they’re not just buying eyeballs, they’re securing access to communities that trust and engage with that content.”
According to him, content is collapsing the traditional funnel. “One short video or livestream can take a consumer from awareness to purchase in under a minute. That’s why we see D2C brands treating content as a compounding asset, not just an expense,” he added.
Devangshu Dutta, founder and CEO of management consulting firm Third Eyesight, echoed the sentiment.
“Large companies are buying or partnering with content-driven platforms to capture attention beyond transactional touch points. Short video, regional language content, and influencer-driven discovery are embedding commerce within entertainment. If you want to sell more than a commodity, storytelling is critical. Content builds credibility, differentiation, and trust in a cluttered and price-sensitive market.”
Flipkart bets big on media and creators
The shift is already reshaping strategy at India’s biggest retailers, and Flipkart has moved fastest. Its move to acquire a majority stake in Pinkvilla, a platform built on entertainment and celebrity news signals a clear push to deepen ties with Gen Z and millennials, a cohort that consumes content first and shops later.
“Our acquisition of a majority stake in Pinkvilla is a critical step in our mission to deepen our engagement with Gen Z. Pinkvilla’s robust content IPs and strong connection with its loyal audience base are assets that will accelerate our efforts to leverage content as a key driver of growth,” said Ravi Iyer, Senior Vice President, Corporate at Flipkart.
Flipkart in the last year has exited investments in companies like Aditya Birla Fashion & Retail, where it sold its 7.5% stake in the owner of Pantaloons, Van Heusen, Louis Philippe and Forever 21, as well as BlackBuck, the trucking marketplace that powers India’s mid-mile logistics.
At the same time, the company has doubled down on content and creators. Its Pinkvilla acquisition gives it access to a platform reaching over 60 million monthly users, while in-house features like Flipkart Feed already clock 5–6 million daily video views, highlighting how commerce and content are converging at scale.
Alongside this, Flipkart has launched Creator Cities in Mumbai, Bengaluru and Gurgaon, production hubs designed for influencers to shoot and scale shoppable content.
It has also introduced Flipkart Feed, a TikTok-style vertical video feature embedded in its app, offering bite-sized, influencer-led, fully shoppable videos. Myntra, its fashion arm, has developed Glamstream, with more than 500 hours of video-first shopping content across music, beauty, travel and weddings, featuring stars like Badshah, Tabu, Zeenat Aman and Vijay Deverakonda.
Flipkart has also partnered with YouTube Shopping, allowing creators with over 10,000 subscribers to tag Flipkart products in videos, Shorts and livestreams, enabling viewers to buy directly while creators earn commissions.
Amazon’s head start in content-commerce convergence Flipkart is not alone. Its biggest rival Amazon has long understood this convergence. Through Prime Video and its original programming slate, Amazon has built an entertainment ecosystem that doubles as a commerce funnel. The shows and films on Prime do not merely entertain; they drive shopping behaviour, influence trends, and lock audiences into Amazon’s larger universe of services. With Fire TV and Alexa integrations, the company has blurred the line between watching and buying, a model others are now racing to replicate.
D2C brands treat content as growth engine
Closer home, the Good Glamm Group, now closed, had pioneered a content-led commerce ecosystem in beauty and personal care. Through acquisitions like ScoopWhoop and MissMalini Entertainment, the group stitched together a portfolio where content platforms brought in audiences, who were then nudged towards its direct-to-consumer brands.
This “editorial-to-checkout” model demonstrated how cultural capital could be translated into purchase pathways. Alibaba has taken the strategy global. With stakes in Youku, a leading video-streaming platform, and Alibaba Pictures, the e-commerce titan integrates entertainment with retail operations. Taobao Live has shown how livestream shopping can dominate consumer behavior, particularly inAsia, creating billion-dollar shopping events entirely dependent on
entertainment-driven discovery.
Shopify, meanwhile, has invested in tools that empower merchants to become content creators themselves. Its partnerships with agencies like Sanity and investments in platforms such as Billo reflect a clear intent to enable retailers to embed storytelling, gamification, and user-generated content into their selling journey. Unlike large marketplaces, Shopify’s vision is not to own the content but to democratize access to it for small and mid-sized businesses.
From content to commerce
This content includes newsletters, creator partnerships, branded podcasts, and niche communities on social media. The idea, as industry experts note, is to treat content as an asset that compounds, not just as a cost.
Unlike ads, content continues to generate discovery and engagement long after it’s published. That’s why more D2C brands are making content central to their growth strategies.
Several big names are experimenting in this space. Durex, Plum, Mother Dairy, and HDFC Bank have launched their own podcasts where celebrities share stories along their brand journey. Founder-led podcasts too are on the rise on YouTube, with voices like Nitin Kamath and Deepinder Goyal drawing large audiences in India.
The big question, however, is whether content consumption can effectively be converted into product discovery and purchase pathways. “It’s already happening at scale,” said Taneja. “Content is redefining every aspect of the traditional funnel. In the past, you had awareness at the top, intent in the middle, and purchase at the bottom. Today, one short video or live stream can take a consumer through that entire journey in under a minute.
“From a D2C lens, this convergence is even more critical. D2C brands thrive on agility, the ability to turn trends, storytelling, and community engagement directly into sales. Platforms like Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and even WhatsApp have embedded shoppable features, which means the content is no longer just ‘top-of-funnel.’ It’s the storefront. But the magic lies in authenticity and design. Consumers don’t want to feel ‘sold to’, they want to feel entertained, inspired, or educated. If the content does that well, conversion becomes a natural byproduct. For example, an athleisure brand showing a workout routine isn’t just demonstrating leggings, it’s giving value. The leggings purchase becomes an easy next step, not a forced pitch.”
The big question: Will content sustain sales at scale?
Taneja further reveals how content is driving sales and long-term growth. “The smartest brands, especially in D2C, have realized that high-quality
content is their most defensible growth engine. Performance marketing will continue to play a role, but the real long-term moat is the kind of content that builds relationships, trust, and recall. Consumers today are spoiled for choice. They don’t buy just products, they buy stories, values, and communities.
“High-quality content allows a brand to consistently show up in ways that feel relevant and credible. And from a business lens, it directly impacts unit economics: it reduces CAC because organic discovery compounds over time, improves LTV because content nurtures loyalty and repeat purchases, and builds resilience because brands with strong content ecosystems are less dependent on fluctuating ad platforms.”
The D2C ecosystem in India is already proving this point. Beauty and personal care brands now run editorial-led platforms alongside commerce, while fashion labels thrive on creator collaborations and storytelling-driven product drops. Their growth is not accidental but built on content strategies that treat every piece not just as a post, but as a business driver.
As an enabler, Taneja adds, the results are visible across platforms. “Brands that invest in content see better conversions on our checkout stack, lower cart drops, and stronger repeat cohorts. Content doesn’t just spark sales it sustains them.”
For all the optimism, the test for content-driven commerce will lie in scale and sustainability. Rising conversions in beauty, fashion, and food show the model works, but questions remain on whether every category can replicate that success, or whether consumers will tire of content-heavy shopping pitches.
(Published in Exchange4Media)
admin
September 5, 2025
Pooja Yadav, Exchange4Media
4 September 2025
Quick commerce today is no longer just about delivering groceries in 10 minutes. It has emerged as one of India’s most coveted retail media channels, where brands are willing to pay a steep premium for visibility.
If FY25 was about building scale, FY26 is definitely shaping up to be about pricing power. With consumer adoption of 10–20-minute delivery apps surging, advertisers are competing for limited inventory, pushing ad rates up by 30–50% year-on-year.
“Ad rates on quick commerce platforms have surged by 30–40% year-onyear, especially during high-impact windows like festive seasons and major cricket events. This is fuelled by rising user engagement and proven performance outcomes. With more sophisticated ad formats and attribution models now in play, advertisers increasingly view the premium as justified,” added Uday Mohan, COO, Havas Media India & Havas Play.
Scale, Pricing & Soaring Ad Rates
While agencies point to surging demand, market data shows that platforms themselves are firming up monetisation models with steep onboarding thresholds.
As per market estimations, Swiggy Instamart offers tiered onboarding packages ranging from ₹4.5 lakh to ₹10 lakh, adjustable against advertising spends over a three-month period. Zepto reportedly asks new or small brands to commit anywhere between ₹2 lakh and ₹7 lakh per month on ads, depending on the category. Blinkit, on the other hand, charges ₹25,000 per SKU per state as a non-refundable onboarding fee, which is credited to the brand’s ad wallet.
This aggressive push comes against the backdrop of a sector that has grown at breakneck speed. According to CareEdge Analytics’ July 2025 data, India’s quick commerce market was valued at around ₹64,000 crore in FY25, growing at a staggering 142% CAGR during FY22–FY25 on the back of evolving consumer preferences, hyperlocal infrastructure, and a low base.
The momentum is expected to continue with strong double-digit growth over the next few years, as adoption deepens in Tier II & III cities, delivery networks expand, and instant fulfilment becomes mainstream.
At the same time, platforms are pivoting from pure hypergrowth to sustainable profitability—tapping into advertising, subscriptions, private labels and tech-led inventory optimization as key revenue levers. This shift is being enabled by India’s expanding digital backbone: with over 1.12 billion mobile connections and 806 million internet users (a 6.5% YoY rise), the country is projected to cross 900 million internet users by the end of 2025. Rising smartphone penetration in both urban and rural areas, aided by affordable data and policy support, has created one of the world’s largest online consumer pools, with 270 million e-shoppers in 2024, making India the second-largest e-retail market globally.
Unsurprisingly, advertisers are flocking to these platforms because that’s where their consumers are. Even though seller commissions contribute the bulk of revenues (68–74%), ad placements and brand boosts already account for 9–11%. Industry data shows that ad rates on quick commerce apps have climbed by 30–50% in just a year, with premiums doubling during high-impact windows like festivals and cricket tournaments. This steep inflation reflects both rising consumer traffic and the limited nature of in-app inventory, pushing brands to pay top dollar for guaranteed visibility at the point of purchase.
Bain’s ‘How India Shops Online 2025’ report also underscores this momentum: beauty, personal care, and snacking categories are already outpacing overall e-retail growth, and these are the very segments leaning most aggressively into quick commerce ads.
“Ad rates on quick commerce platforms have jumped by nearly 40–50% compared to last year. This spike reflects that premium brands are willing to pay for immediacy and guaranteed visibility, where ad placement directly links to instant purchase behaviour,” said Mandar Lande, founder of Waayu, a zero-commission food delivery app in India.
According to Aditya Aima, Managing Director, Growth Markets; Co-MD, India & MENA, AnyMind Group, ad rates on quick commerce platforms have not only risen but demand has intensified. “The surge is fuelled by three dynamics: sticky consumer behavior with high visit frequency, dense purchase intent compared to social or entertainment platforms, and the scarcity of ad real estate.”
Quick commerce becomes a strategic channel
For brands, quick commerce has moved far beyond being a fulfillment partner. It has become a strategic advertising channel, especially for those in fast-moving and competitive categories like beauty, wellness, snacks, and personal care. The platforms offer not just last-mile delivery but also front-of-shelf visibility in an increasingly cluttered digital environment.
According to Seshu Kumar Tirumala, Chief Buying and Merchandising Officer, bigbasket, “Brands are moving beyond purely search-centric strategies and increasingly adopting immersive display activations with formats like Spotlight Videos, Banners with Add-to-Cart (ATC), targeted banners, and ATC widgets. For established brands, most investments still flow into performance-led formats such as Sponsored/PLA ads, while a portion is reserved for top-funnel initiatives like storytelling, new launches, and high-visibility events. Emerging or smaller brands usually begin with awareness and consideration campaigns before shifting focus toward performance once they’ve built stronger customer connections.” Unlike marketplaces or social media, quick commerce blends data-led targeting, high engagement, and measurable ROI.
Many brands pair Q-comm placements with collab ads on Meta, Google, and Criteo to build visibility while keeping consumers engaged across the funnel. This creates a sharper, closed-loop system where awareness, consideration, and conversion happen almost instantly. “D2C brands have been rapidly scaling up ad spends on quick commerce platforms, up to 40–50% year-on-year, with a significant share during the festive season. Among the key reasons are fast-growing adoption of Qcomm by consumers and better ROI than marketplaces,” said Shrikant Shenoy, AVP at Lodestar UM.
What sets this instant delivery model apart is its ability to compress the purchase journey. Marketplaces drive comparisons, and social platforms spark discovery, but Q-comm taps into impulse buying with SKU-level attribution.
“The quick delivery model encourages impulse purchases and immediate gratification shopping, which is particularly valuable for D2C brands. Qcomm platforms have lower competition density, and ad formats are more native and less cluttered than traditional e-commerce,” said Devangshu Dutta, founder of Third Eyesight.
“When someone opens Blinkit or Zepto, they’re usually in active purchase mode, not just browsing. For consumables, personal care, or lifestyle products, this is the sweet spot of marketing,” Dutta noted.
“Ad rates on quick commerce have gone up by more than 20% in the last year. If you want a prime slot, say a homepage banner in a big city, you might even be paying 50% more than last year. Because every brand wants it. When a Blinkit or Swiggy placement can move your product in minutes, not weeks, those ads aren’t just distribution, they are discovery,” said Mohit Singh, Head of Product at Zippee, a quick commerce logistics platform.
Meanwhile, pricing pressures are only going up. Ratnakar Bharti, VP, Media, Mudramax said, “Quick commerce isn’t just ‘fast delivery’ anymore, it has become high-intent retail media sitting right next to the ‘add to cart’ button, with sales that can be measured in real time. Quick commerce platforms say their ads business grew 5X in a year to about $200M ARR. At that kind of scale, inventory quality improves, targeting gets sharper, and the medium starts looking like the next big retail media play.”
“In a nutshell, expect meaningfully higher prices in peak weeks — often up to 2x — and a higher year-round floor price due to steeper minimums and fees. The trade-off is harder proof of sales at the exact SKU, which is why demand and prices are rising,” Bharti added.
“Brands pay a premium for Q-Comm because it drives sales at the point of purchase. What began as experimental spends has now become a steady line item in media plans, thanks to strong ROI and proven results,” added Jatin Kapoor, MD, AdsFlourish.
Beauty, beverages & snacking lead the charge
Notably, not all categories are leaning on quick commerce equally. Industry executives point out that beauty & personal care, beverages, snacking, and wellness are the biggest spenders, given their high repeatability, impulse-driven nature, and urban skew.
Beauty and personal care brands, for instance, are using Q-comm not just to drive trial packs and quick replenishment, but also to run festival-led campaigns targeting affluent millennials. Similarly, beverages and packaged snacks are thriving on the “in-the-moment” consumption occasions that these apps uniquely enable.
“The biggest spenders are beverages, beauty, packaged foods, and wellness. Those categories thrive on impulse and repeat consumption, which is exactly what quick commerce delivers best,” Singh added. As per many industry experts, wellness and lifestyle brands, too, are seeing outsized returns. From daily supplements to discreet personal care items, quick commerce is proving to be a low-friction purchase environment with high conversion rates.
“Quick commerce platforms have lower competition density, and ad formats are more native and less cluttered than traditional e-commerce,” explained Dutta.
Media buyers also note that Q-comm platforms are evolving fast, offering more contextual in-app placements and data-driven targeting. This is creating a level playing field for challenger brands that lack legacy shelf space in offline retail.
“Quick commerce advertising is inherently contextual. A beverage or snack brand running an IPL campaign is literally tapping into the consumer’s 15-minute window of intent, it’s that instant,” added Mohan.
With ad rates on quick commerce platforms climbing 30–50% year-on-year, it’s clear the medium is shifting from experimental budgets to a core retail media channel. However, with competition heating up, festive weeks commanding 2X pricing, and minimum spends rising, the question is: how long before quick commerce ads start resembling the crowded, high-cost landscape of traditional e-commerce marketplaces?
(Published in Exchange4Media)
admin
August 18, 2025
Hiral Goyal, The Morning Context
18 August 2025
A trend that has been playing out through big and small changes over the last two decades is that in urban India the kirana store is easily replaceable.
When it comes to buying groceries, urban Indians have a number of options. They can visit a fancy supermarket run by a conglomerate or order online through a number of e-commerce and instant-delivery companies. And if the above doesn’t seem easy enough, they can hop over to a nearby mom-and-pop store.
It would appear it is now the turn of smaller towns in the country to witness the kirana disruption. Even though 99% of grocery shopping in these tier-3 cities is done through neighborhood general stores, there are startups that believe this is an outdated and inefficient form of retail and a change is in order.
One such company is SuperK. The startup’s mission is to build a grocery store model in small towns that has all of the advantages of modern retail packed in a compact 800-square-foot store. This is what Anil Thontepu and Neeraj Menta had set out to do when they founded the company in 2019. The idea was to bring a modern trade-like grocery shopping experience to small-town India a wide assortment of products at a better value.
“There is a cost-efficient world of general trade and a customer-loving world of modern retail,” says Thontepu. “We wanted to see if we can bridge this gap…and do something for the small-town people by bringing the best of both these worlds.”
Over the past five years, the Bengaluru-headquartered startup has opened over 130 stores across 80 towns in Andhra Pradesh. And it doesn’t want to stop there. The company wants to expand to another 300 towns in Andhra Pradesh and nearby states of Karnataka and Telangana over the next 24, months. That’s quite an ambitious target. But the founders believe the market size for Superk is so large that they should be able to build a Rs 2,000-3,000 стоore ($228-342 million) annual business from Andhra and Telangana alone.
To fuel this expansion, Superk raised Rs 100 crore ($11.7 million) in Series B funding last month. The round, led by Binny Bansal’s 3STATE Ventures and CaratLane founder Mithun Sacheti, valued Superk at 2-2.5x its previous valuation of Rs 160 crore (about $18.25 million) in 202/
Now, Superk is not entirely unique. It competes with startups like Frendy, Apna Mart and Wheelocity, which are also trying to organize the retail market in India’s smaller towns. What sets SuperK apart is its larger, bolder approach. Grocery chain Apna Mart, for instance, runs franchisee stores in tier-2 or tier-3 markets and also offers 15-minute home delivery, SuperK’s focus is only on supermarkets. Frendy operates mini-marts and micro-kiranas in villages and towns with fewer than 10,000 people, but SuperK targets small towns with populations between 20,000 and 500,000. And Wheelocity supplies only fresh produce to rural areas, while Superk sells dry groceries as well as packaged consumer goods.
This rather radical shift in focus-away from tier-1 and tier-2 cities-ties in with India’s changing consumption pattern. “Consumer mindsets are changing even in smaller cities,” says Devangshu Dutta, founder and chief executive of Third Eyesight, adding that these consumers are beginning to favour more modern retail environments. And NielsenIQ’s latest report says rural markets in India grew twice as fast as cities between April and June 2025.
In this landscape, SuperK fits like a glove, with its franchise-first approach. Thanks to an asset-light model, the company has the agility to go deeper into smaller towns.
But it won’t be all that easy either. As Dutta says, “Changing grocery habits is a long, capital-intensive game.” Moreover, big retail chains are also jumping on the bandwagon. Hypermarket chain Vishal Mega Mart, for instance, already operates 47% of its stores in tier-3 cities and plans to expand into cities with populations exceeding 50,000. Supermarket chain operator DMart is also focusing on tier-2 and tier-3 cities.
However, Superk founders believe they are prepared for the challenge. Menta says the startup has arrived at a business model that is scalable, sustainable and, more importantly, offers value to its customers.
It’s too early to say whether they will be successful in this endeavour. That said, SuperK appears to have built a smart retail business for small-town India.
Refining small-town retail
SuperK’s founders have drawn inspiration from domestic and international retail chains like DMart and Costco. But they haven’t duplicated their strategies and made their own tweaks instead. For instance, large retail chains usually run company-owned and company operated, or COCO, stores. Though this approach is more cost-intensive than the franchise model, it allows a company to ensure a uniform customer experience across all outlets:
Superk doesn’t do that. It runs only franchise-owned and franchise-operated (FOFO) stores, which are no bigger than 800 sq ft. The company is not the first to have experimented with this model, but Thontepu believes that everyone else before them “did not try with the right spirit”. A franchise-owned store, argues co-founder Menta, is run differently from a company-owned store one has to keep in mind the store owner’s incentives, needs and concerns.
Under the franchise model, entrepreneurs invest between Rs 12 lakh (about $13,690) and Rs 15 lakh (about $17,110) to set up a Superk store. Of this, Rs 4 lakh (nearly $4,560) is spent on the store fit-out and infrastructure, the rest goes towards buying inventory. These stores, according to Menta, typically achieve a breakeven point after six months. On average, a retail store takes longer than that-12-15 months to reach breakeven.
Superk fills the shelves by procuring its inventory directly from brands as well as distributors. “The inventory is recommended by us through a mobile application. Store owners have an option to make certain changes within the limits that we have set for them,” says Thontepu. Revenue is shared and the model is similar to the one followed by nearly all retailers in India. Franchisees earn varying levels of margins on different kinds of products, depending on how easy or tough it is to sell those items. For instance, staples like dal and rice have lower margins, while confectionary items and products that need greater effort to sell enjoy higher margins of up to 20%.
In addition to this, there’s a private label business, especially loose items like pulses. In fact, private labelling is part of the company’s efforts to bring some standardization in India’s unorganized retail market. “A customer coming to our store should be able to blindly expect consistent quality on the product they’re buying,” says Menta. “We have organized our sourcing, processing, cleaning, packaging, testing. Everything that a brand would do to provide a great-quality product to their customer.”
Unlike distributors or other retailers who operate franchise models though, Superk claims that it does not dump its inventory on store owners. Menta says the franchise structure is designed in a way that Superk does not benefit from selling unnecessary stock to store owners. “If I lose, he will lose. If he loses, I lose. That is the way (the structure) is created. We, in fact, recommend owners to remove some products if they are not selling.” says Menta.
On the customer side of things, Superk’s value proposition comes down to offering the best prices. More than a year ago, for instance, it introduced a membership programme that offers customers cashback that is redeemable on their future purchases. “If they pay Rs 300 [approximately $3.5) for a six-month membership, they get 10% cashback on all purchases that they are making up to Rs 300 every month,” explains Thontepu. He says 35-40% of Superk’s more than 500,000 customers are enrolled in this programme.
All of this sounds good even promising in theory. But will it be enough to build a sustainable and scalable retail business?
A long, hard look
Let’s first look at what really works in SuperK’s favour.
One, the focus on selling staples under a private label brand. This has been done successfully before. One example is Nilgiri’s, one of India’s oldest supermarket chains.
Founded in 1905, Niligiri’s operated under a franchise model and sold dairy, baked goods, chocolates and other items produced under its own brand. The supermarket chain was sold by debt-ridden Future Group for Rs 67 crore ($7.65 million) in 2023, less than one-third the price the latter paid to acquire the company from private equity firm Actis in 2014. However, its history is worth learning from.
Shomik Mukherjee, a Delhi-based consumer goods advisor who was a partner at Actis while the firm was in control of Nilgiri’s, recalls the value proposition created by Nilgiri’s private label products. “In the case of private labels, it is essential for a company to have a reason why people will walk into that store. For Nilgiri’s, it was bakery and dairy products,” says Mukherjee. Owning a private label that brought in customers also ensured that franchisee owners had incentives to continue working with Nilgiri’s. “It is about giving the franchisees a safe portfolio of private label goods that are desired by customer instead of something that is shoved down the franchisees’ throat to derive margin,” he says.
You see, the overall grocery business operates on a very low margin. But private labelling, says Satish Meena, founder of Datum Intelligence, offers the highest margins – 35-40% – in the grocery business, after fresh produce, making it a lucrative business to get into.
Superk, which sells essential items through its private label, has the opportunity to earn better margins in grocery retail. More importantly, private labelling holds the potential to become SuperK’s identity and boost customer retention and loyalty.
Two, SuperK’s franchise model allows it to expand to more locations rapidly as compared to a regular modern trade chain with company-owned stores, says Mukherjee. This model makes SuperK’s business asset-light and brings down the cost of running a network of stores. “Under this model, the franchisor does not incur the upfront cost of opening a store or having to deal with the trouble of hiring and replacing store managers,” he adds. Since most store owners in a franchise model are landowners, there is a greater stability in operations as well, he explains. Moreover, Superk stores are quite small (800 sq ft), allowing easier availability of property.
The franchise model, however, is not entirely foolproof. One of the inherent problems is the difficulty in implementing standard operating procedures (SOPs) across all stores. And the problem only worsens as the company expands operations to different cities. While Superk stores boast a no-frills fit-out that can be easily set up anywhere, how these stores are maintained through the wear and tear over the years is yet to be seen.
A bigger fear is that the store owner may start running their own store without the Superk branding. “If Superk loses the franchisee owner, it also loses the location in which the store was operating,” says Mukherjee.
Moreover, most franchisee owners in the retail business typically tend to be experienced general store owners who might not be willing to adopt new technology. “Since they have run a store before, they think they know how and what to order for inventory and may not follow SuperK’s tech-enabled recommendations,” says Mukherjee.
There’s another problem. While the founders claim to have seen considerable success (35-40% sign-ups) in the rollout of SuperK’s membership programme for customers, Third Eyesight’s Dutta raises concerns about its future growth. “Indian consumers’ price sensitivity limits membership fee potential,” he says. According to him, the programme’s value in the tier-3 market lies more in customer acquisition and retention than direct revenue generation. “Long-term success requires a cashback programme to drive purchase frequency and basket size increases to offset the costs,” says Dutta.
Menta, however, has a different view. He says SuperK’s subscription is designed in a way that benefits customers only when they make full basket purchases. Moreover, the company has different pricing slabs for membership depending on the various basket sizes, which makes the model more viable. Considering the programme is a little more than a year old, it is still too early to judge whether it will find a lot of takers in small towns.
For now, the founders are in no hurry to expand their business across India. “There is no reason to go into five states. Then, you are spread thin and your economics will not work out. It’s a business of managing operations at a very low cost,” says Menta. The plan is to stick to one region and continue to go deeper into it. “A lot of our competitors who started five years ago spread to so many places that it became very difficult for them to manage,” he adds.
This is also the crux of how Thontepu and Menta are building SuperK. By implementing what they have learnt not only from their own experiments, but also from the failures and successes of other businesses. While there’s no guarantee that Superk will become a roaring success, it does appear to have set an example by starting small and growing patiently. And if the latest funding is any proof, investors are interested.
(With inputs from Neethi Lisa Rojan)
(Published in The Morning Context)
admin
August 5, 2025
Aakriti Bansal, Medianama
August 5, 2025
MediaNama’s Take: Swiggy is shifting from individual convenience to workplace capture. With DeskEats and Corporate Rewards, the company is embedding itself directly into the workday. This move is not just about food delivery. It is about becoming part of employees’ daily routines. More repetition leads to more orders, stronger retention, and access to a new layer of user behaviour: professional identity.
This approach draws from older models like office canteens and Sodexo meal cards. However, Swiggy reworks it for the app economy. Instead of fixed menus or closed ecosystems, it offers personalized choices tied to employer-subsidised benefits. That creates stickiness. When a company supports one app and offers discounts, switching becomes less likely.
The key question now is whether this integration creates lasting value or opens up new responsibilities. These include questions around consent, profiling, and where to draw the line between workplace systems and digital platforms.
What’s the News
Swiggy rolled out DeskEats, a curated food delivery collection for working professionals, in 30 cities and over 7,000 corporate hubs, according to Storyboard18. MediaNama also reviewed the feature on the Swiggy app. The collection includes categories like Stress Munchies, Healthy Nibbles, One-Handed Grabbies, and Deadline Desserts, aimed at common workday cravings.
During the pilot, DeskEats reached 14,000 companies and 1.5 lakh employees. Users can find it in the app by typing “Office” or “Work.”
Swiggy also launched Corporate Rewards, which lets users access benefits by verifying their work email. These include flat Rs 225 off food orders, Rs 2,000 off on Dineout, and Rs 100 off on Instamart.
On LinkedIn, Swiggy VP Deepak Maloo described Corporate Rewards as the professional version of its earlier Student Rewards program which offers perks like free deliveries, flat Rs 200 discounts, and deals starting at Rs 49, tailored for students aged 18–25 across India.
Financial Context
Swiggy may have launched DeskEats while under pressure to control its burn. In Q1 FY26, it spent Rs 1,036 crore on ads—a 132% jump and posted a loss of Rs 1,197 crore. DeskEats and Corporate Rewards offer a way to stabilise repeat orders without over-relying on discounts or ad spending.
The company’s adjusted Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation and Amortisation (EBITDA) loss widened to Rs 813 crore. Overall, food delivery revenue grew by 20.2% year-over-year to Rs 2,080 crore, with order volume growing by 23.3%. At the same time, newer formats like ultrafast Bolt and SNACC are aimed at increasing consumption frequency and improving retention. These efforts signal Swiggy’s larger bet on everyday integration to drive value.
Platform Strategy and Corporate Integration
DeskEats gives Swiggy access to dense, time-sensitive demand during work hours. Devangshu Dutta, founder of Third Eyesight, says this helps streamline operations: “By integrating directly with workplaces, Swiggy can anchor itself in employees’ daily routines and provide a more predictable stream of orders.”
He adds, “Scheduled office meals create habitual consumption patterns and increase customer lifetime value, especially when the employer endorses a single platform and offers a favourable price-value mix.”
“This is the age-old model followed by contracted office canteens or cafeterias as well, but updated to the mobile app era, with more flexibility in terms of the items that an individual can order based on their own preferences”, Dutta added.
Furthermore Dutta opined, “Adoption is likely to be more in the larger cities where there is a greater concentration of demand and out-of-home consumption is higher among migrant professionals with high discretionary spending power.”
Data, Consent, and Workplace Targeting
To access Corporate Rewards, users verify with their work email. Swiggy hasn’t said whether it collects additional employee data or whether employers see usage metrics. It’s also unclear if enrolment is opt-in or automatic.
This concern mirrors recent questions raised about Zepto, which began recommending mood-specific product bundles like “Crampy” or “Ragey” based on user searches for PMS. Critics pointed out that such inferences may not be accurate and are often made without the user’s explicit awareness. Zepto’s privacy policy permits broad data collection, including health and behavioural patterns, but lacks clear disclosure on profiling. While Swiggy may not be doing this visibly, the direction of workplace-linked behaviour data raises similar concerns under India’s Digital Personal Data Protection Act (DPDPA), which still doesn’t regulate inferred or behavioural data clearly.
As this model scales, it raises questions under India’s DPDPA especially around purpose limitation and workplace-based profiling.
Why This Matters
Swiggy’s push into the workplace mirrors a broader shift across the food delivery market. Zomato recently launched ‘Zomato for Enterprise,’ a corporate food expense management platform that allows employees to charge business orders directly to their companies. With features like budgeting, ordering rules, and account toggling between work and personal use, Zomato is positioning itself as a paperless, digital alternative to legacy players like Sodexo. According to CEO Deepinder Goyal, over 100 companies have already onboarded the platform.
This move signals intensifying competition in the enterprise food space. While Zomato focuses on billing and reimbursements through employer-tied accounts, Swiggy is targeting recurring workplace consumption through curated menus and behavioural nudges. Both platforms appear to be building business-facing verticals that go beyond consumer ordering, aiming to lock in institutional clients and expand platform dependency within the workspace.
Unanswered Questions
MediaNama reached out to Swiggy with the following questions. The article will be updated when we receive a response:
Is Swiggy positioning DeskEats and Corporate Rewards as part of a larger shift into corporate benefits?
How do companies sign up for Corporate Rewards? Are there different plans or models based on company size?
What employee data does Swiggy collect when someone signs up using their work email?
Are DeskEats and Corporate Rewards linked to Swiggy One or any other paid subscription?
How many companies and users are currently active on DeskEats?
Does Swiggy plan to scale this into a standalone B2B vertical?(Published in Medianama)
admin
July 16, 2025
Prabhanu Kumar Das, Medianama
16 July 2025
E-commerce logistics platform Shiprocket announced the launch of Shunya.ai, a sovereign AI model developed in India to support the country’s Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), on July 11. The company claims that it is India’s first multimodal AI stack, built in partnership with US-based Ultrasafe Inc.
This announcement comes at the heels of Shiprocket filing a confidential draft red herring prospectus (DHRP) with the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in May 2025 for their Initial Public Offering (IPO). The company is expected to raise around Rs 2500 crore in its IPO.
What does the AI model offer?
As per Shiprocket’s website, Shunya.ai is built on a freemium model, with unlimited access priced at Rs 499 a month for MSMEs. It is directly integrated into the Shiprocket platform and offers AI agents across multiple languages. According to the company, the agents can perform the following tasks:
Shiprocket CEO Saahil Goel stated, “We’ve adapted Shunya.ai from the ground up for Indian languages, commerce workflows, and MSME needs. By embedding it directly into our platform, we’re giving over 1,50,000 sellers instant access to tools that are intelligent, local, and scalable, levelling the playing field for businesses across Bharat.” Notably, Larsen and Toubro’s AI cloud arm, Cloudfiniti is reportedly providing the underlying GPU infrastructure, ensuring that all data processing and storage remains within India.
This AI model does offer multiple benefits but it will not level the playing field against big players, as per Devangshu Dutta who is the founder of specialist consulting firm, Third Eyesight.
“While Shunya AI can help small businesses compete better, it won’t completely level the playing field. Large companies still have greater organisational capacity and capability to respond to the insights offered, including more data and bigger budgets. The real benefit for small businesses is improving how they work and serve customers within their current markets, rather than suddenly competing with giants,” Dutta said.
The E-Commerce AI Pivot
This is not the first time that an Indian e-commerce platform has unveiled a B2B AI service through its existing platform. Zepto recently launched Zepto Atom in May 2025, a real-time tool that offers consumer brands available on the platform minute-level updates, PIN-code level performance maps, and Zepto GPT, a Natural Language Processing (NLP) assistant trained on internal data that brands can query about their stock keeping units (SKUs) and performance data.
Zomato and its e-commerce arm Blinkit have also been growing their AI capabilities. Analytics India Magazine previously reported that the company’s generative AI team has grown from 3 to 20 engineers in the time-span of a year. Zomato introduced a personalised AI food assistant for users, and also uses AI in its backend to optimise delivery times and improve consumer support. Blinkit also released the Recipe Rover AI in May 2023, an AI assistant for recipes.
Other companies like Swiggy with ‘What to Eat’ AI, Myntra’s MyFashionGPT AI shopping assistant, and Amazon’s Rufus have also adopted AI assistants on their platform as a tool for the consumer.
The issue of merchant stickiness
Dutta asserts that this shift means platforms like Zepto and Shiprocket are changing from being service providers to becoming data intelligence companies. They are generating, or are in the process of generating revenue through transactional data that flows through the company.
“While this can create better insights and automation for merchants on these platforms, it also could make the merchants more dependent on the platforms. Once a merchant builds its operations around a platform’s specific AI tools and insights, it becomes much harder to switch to a competitor – creating stronger merchant stickiness. We already see this in infrastructure and core services such as banking and financial services, enterprise cloud services, building management etc. and the same is likely to happen in AI-enabled process management”, he said.
Why this matters
As Shiprocket is preparing for an IPO, Shunya.ai becomes another means to generate revenue for the company. This app can extend Shiprocket’s reach to local physical stores and MSMEs, by offering them the opportunity to provide the same experiences and support to the consumer that larger retailers and e-commerce platforms do, while automating delivery automation, cataloguing, and customer support.
Furthermore, the launch of this model is also part of the larger trend of AI integration and automation, both within e-commerce platforms for their consumers and within the back-end for optimisation.
Competition in these sectors and merchant stickiness may also become an issue, as businesses hosted on these e-commerce services may become reliant on specific AI tools and their outputs.
Questions of data privacy are also important when it comes to service companies moving towards data intelligence: How do these AI models gather and use data? The consent of end-consumers in these B2B models, data storage, and security are all issues that need to be studied as e-commerce and retails pivots towards AI.
Some Unanswered Questions
MediaNama has reached out to Shiprocket with the following questions and will update the article when we receive a response.
(Published in Medianama)