The Indian multinational conglomerate, Reliance Industries, is working in new industries and expanding its reach to the public with new and updated services. Recently, the Mukesh Ambani led company, has entered the grocery delivery market with its new facility, Jio Mart, which is a hyperlocal Kirana stores-led e-marketplace.
With the service currently operating in Navi Mumbai, Thane, and Kalyan, the company is testing the product, and they plan to scale the operations to the national level soon. Reliance’s chairman Ambani hinted towards the company’s entry into the e-commerce segment last year and again in August 2019 at Reliance’s 42 annual meets. They announced that the company is ready to connect three crores, offline retailers, to more than 20 crore households with the latest venture.
According to the official website, the platform is planning to host a catalog of 50 thousand grocery products and provide free home delivery irrespective of the order value. The company is also planning to offer no questions asked return and express delivery. The company promoted its products by inviting the Jio users to register on Jio Mart and avail discounts. The website highlighted that early customers would get up to INR 3000 for pre-registration.
Should Grofers and BigBasket be worried?
Recently, Grofers announced that they are profitable in Delhi and Mumbai and are reaching the break-even point in Kolkata and Lucknow. On the other hand, BigBasket announced that it is close to the break-even point in Tier 10 cities, including Delhi, Mumbai, and Bengaluru, in the next 3-4 months. Hari Menon, the co-founder of BigBasket, announced that the company would discuss its path to profitability in 2020-21. Amazon and Flipkart are also entering the grocery delivery business.
