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Time of India
2 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Quick commerce is the new battleground: How brands are adapting, scaling and winning the 10-minute race
Bengaluru: Quick commerce , once an emerging experiment, has now become a growth engine for new-age brands and legacy players alike. At the recently held panel discussion at ETRetail's E-commerce & Digital Natives Summit 2025, titled 'Instant Impact: What Brands Must Get Right in Quick Commerce Ecosystems' moderated by Jivraj Singh Sachar, Investor and Podcaster, Indian Silicon Valley , founders and senior leaders across categories shared how they are decoding the unique opportunities and constraints of this fast-evolving channel. Vinay Maheshwari, Founder and CEO, The Health Factory , said his brand was an early mover in quick commerce. 'Traditional trade is very difficult to penetrate when you're doing retail and get that distribution right. It takes brands years and years of experience, and I believe that every new channel gives rise to new brands. And quick commerce is that level playing field where national players and the D2C/new age brands get a level playing ground,' he said. He emphasised how quick commerce allows for rapid national expansion. 'Now you can do 40 cities in the span of six months. If you've got your operations ready, you've got your manufacturing ready... at least from a distribution standpoint, it gives you leverage into the Indian ecosystem.' Pallav Bihani, Founder and CEO, Boldfit , admitted initial scepticism about his fitness accessories selling on 10-minute platforms. 'We never thought people would buy yoga mats on Blinkit… but I think it's the new reality,' he said. 'Quick commerce works well if you've built a lot of awareness elsewhere. Not a great platform to build discoverability unless you're in a very specific use case. But once that awareness is there, it becomes a great channel to capitalise on the demand you've created.' He warned that brands ignoring this channel could risk being forgotten. 'It's to capture the intent that's there. Brands that are not there on quick commerce right now stand a huge risk of being forgotten.' Ankur Goel, COO, Epigamia (Drums Food International) , shared that his experience underscored the platform's strength in consumption and flexibility. 'Quick commerce is a lot less prone to seasonality,' he said, explaining that reduced store footfalls during rains don't affect consumption thanks to at-home delivery. 'If I wanted to eat one cup of Greek yogurt, I will end up ordering a pack of four.' Highlighting the marketing opportunities unique to quick commerce, he added, 'Epigamia is a breakfast option at 9am, a mid-meal snack at 12pm, a post-workout snack at 6pm, a dessert post 10pm. The flexibility with quick commerce is that I can tailor my communication depending on the actual use case, a luxury traditional retail doesn't offer.' Rahul Kumar Srivastava, COO, Parag Milk Foods , noted that while 95 per cent of their business still comes from traditional channels, quick commerce is seeing exponential growth. 'We are still learning,' he said. 'We manufacture ghee under Govardhan, cheese under Go, farm-to-home milk under Pride of Cows, and sports nutrition under Avvatar. Each has a preferred channel, but we're seeing tremendous growth on quick commerce across categories from milk to paneer, yoghurt to flavoured milk.' He highlighted operational challenges. 'We have to manage micro inventory for very hyperlocal fulfilment. Milk has a two-day shelf life, curd is 15 days, paneer is 20… how are you going to handle 40-50% growth with perishable commodities?' Akshay Gulati, Co-Founder and CEO, Slikk , which operates in fashion and lifestyle, discussed how apparel presents unique challenges for Q-commerce. 'Fashion and lifestyle is an input-difficult business,' he said. "Generally, other verticals are output difficult. But here, supply chain is complex, with brands having thousands of SKUs.' Since quick commerce is real-estate constrained at the backend, SKU selection becomes critical. 'You have to be super careful in terms of what you put in your dark store and whether it's loved by customers… it's very important to get that Pareto right,' he said, referring to the 80/20 rule of sales concentration. 'The biggest challenge is replan. Fashion has a longer lifecycle. It's capital intensive, recovery is slower. So, we've focused deeply on understanding supply chain better than traditional marketplaces.' Aniket Shah, Co-Founder and CEO, Swish , a brand focused on 10-minute food delivery, spoke about competing in a space dominated by giants like Zomato and Swiggy. 'Food has the highest product-market fit when it comes to 10 minutes,' he said. 'Everyone wants everything from chai to dessert, delivered quickly.' To build a differentiated product, Shah focused on infra-first innovation. 'Even if there's one bad experience, not just on time but on quality, people just tend not to order again. So consistency and quality is very important. We have started imagining how the infrastructure for kitchens should be built so that food can be prepared faster."
Time of India
3 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Your Brand Lives Online Now. Why Indian Retail Needs a Digital Wake-Up Call
For years, retail success meant having great stores, stylish interiors, and busy footfalls. But in 2025, the real shopping doesn't start on the street, it's online. Still, most digital stores today feel basic, outdated, or like Rander, Founder and CEO of BOMBAYDC, tells ETRetail why this mindset needs to change and how retailers can build powerful, experience-first digital stores that actually grow the brand. Edited excerpts: Q: As a digital products company that builds digital experiences, you work with many retailers. We see that the physical retail stores are often well-designed and thoughtful. But why do the digital stores for many of these same brands look basic as if treating the online store as a side channel? Ankur Rander: Today, in the era of connected world commerce, people discover, research, and compare products online. That's what drives both online and offline sales. So, investing significantly in offline stores while using generic e-commerce templates for digital stores is a missed chance by brands to stand out. If an online store doesn't make the brand felt, it is losing an opportunity to be considered. Q: So, in your opinion, what makes a good digital store today? Ankur Rander: Right now, many digital stores are treated like brochures. But they need to be living systems that respond and adapt. A digital store is also not just a website anymore. It's an ongoing experience that happens across mobile, desktop, voice, chat and even in local languages. It should feel alive, not static. A great store today: Offers convenience of all kinds. Convenience trumps most easy to scroll and scan through with various options to find a product brand - in a top-to-bottom scroll, it should convey why your brand almost like an offline conversation with an expert and helps people feel the product even when they can't touch it. Gives consumers an elevated yet simple product understanding and thus enables them to make informed decisions and not just list real time AI-driven recommendations that are based on users browsing and purchase content. using visuals and videos to explain the product and its usage, detailed imagery Social proof backed by influencer content and more. Connects seamlessly with your offline store in meaningful ways such as real-time inventory view, live video calls with store staff to see the material closely, etc. Find at the store and pick up at the store. Should have a super streamlined and trackable returns and delivery process with a fast and stable checkout. Interestingly, size mismatch is one of the biggest reasons to return an online purchased perhaps, a better UX for customers to experience the size and make an informed purchase would help reduce returns. Q: In India, internet adoption is seeing massive growth, especially in tier 2 and beyond markets. It is plausible that the next 500 million shoppers won't all speak English or type fast. What role do you see vernacular languages playing in the growth of retail and digital commerce? Ankur Rander: It's not just helpful, it's the biggest unlock. Traditionally, navigating a website meant clicking through menus: Men → Sports Shoes → Styles → Scroll through 100 products. It's tedious. It's not how real people shop. Now imagine this: A user simply says, 'Mujhe black shoes chahiye' and sees exactly that, they glance through the results and add, 'Shinny material nahi chahiye, office wear chahiye' and instantly, the list updates again. That's the future, not dropdowns and filters, but conversation-led commerce. Thanks to large language models that support over 12 Indian languages, the entire country can now shop in their own language. Designing for voice and vernacular is no longer optional. It's the gateway to India's next 500 million digital customers. Because when someone can speak in Kannada, Bhojpuri, or Marathi and find exactly what they want, that's not just better UX. That's real inclusion and progress. Q: For this new age of consumers, how do you envision AI and other advanced technologies will change the online shopping experience? Ankur Rander: We're already testing prototypes that lets users talk to a website or app. You say what you want. The system uses AI, we are currently using the Open AI models along with our own architecture and understands your request, and shows results directly. It tries to understand intent and helps people shortlist.. It works in many Indian languages. So suddenly, your store becomes accessible to 50 per cent more people. That's a huge opportunity. Q: Going back to your work with retailers, what happens when a brand works with BOMBAYDC? How does their journey of building a digital store of 2025 look like and how would you define the ROI? Ankur Rander: The first step is plotting. BOMBAYDC's team shops the brand's products just like customers do. That gives insight into the gaps and opportunities. The team studies the product, the brand, and what the customer is really looking for when they want to buy. Then, they map the user journey, which varies for different products like shoes, refrigerators, or clothing. Some products need more explanation than others. Some need more education than others. The job is to understand what questions a customer asks before they even enter the category, and then build helpful interventions along that journey. Next, the right design and content are applied - videos, images, UX flows, all aligned to the brand's tone and the consumer's mindset. The third, and often most broken piece, is design-tech synergy. At most companies, design and development teams are disconnected. This leads to common breakdowns, like a design that can't be built properly. At BOMBAYDC , this doesn't happen. Strategy, design, content, and tech are all built under one roof to ensure delivery and alignment. And yes, the ROI is real and here is why and how it matters. Every product discovery starts online. Before a customer walks into a store, they've already searched for the product, compared it with alternatives, and perhaps read up on features, reviews, or watched videos. This really means that 70–80% of the decision about making the purchase is already made online. Thus, if your brand doesn't show up with the right information, experience, and storytelling during discovery, it's already lost the game. Q: Any recent work? Ankur Rander: A great example is Lotto India . Their newly launched digital store in India was designed by us for 'everyday athletes' and delivers a style-first, mobile-native experience. These are brands now meeting users where they are - online, with clarity and conviction. We used video to let users experience the product's fit and function. Q: One final question Ankur, what do you think CMOs and CXOs should be asking their digital and marketing teams? Ankur Rander: Sure. It's important to ask: Does our digital store give customers the whiff of our brand? For eg: Is it as premium as our product? Are we designing an experience that will help users shortlist the products?Is our design, content and assets enough to interest people and give the right and targeted information to take the next steps?Are we delivering what today's customers expect as default: fast shipping, easy returns, the right kind of offers, and frictionless checkout? Are we taking advantage of the possibilities of a digital store today?
Time of India
5 days ago
- Business
- Time of India
Unify Foodworks to invest Rs 40 crore to open 100 outlets of American soft serve brand Carvel
Carvel , one of America's legacy brands known for soft serve, has tied up with Unify Foodworks to enter the Indian market in August with its first store opening in New Delhi, Sumer Sethi, founder, Unify Foodworks told ETRetail. Unify Foodworks, which holds exclusive master franchise rights for Carvel in India, plans to launch 100 stores over the next 5 years with an investment of Rs 40 crore. "We are eying to capture 7-8 per cent market share of soft serve ice creams over the next 5 years," he asserted. "In my experience, what works in India is when a brand owns a category. It's very difficult to dislodge that kind of loyal consumer recall. That's why we decided to bring a soft serve brand to India. Carvel has its patented recipe that can produce the freshest form of ice cream in-store," he further explained. The brand, which plans to open 50 stores in phase 1 concentrated in and around North India, will be offering 32 SKUs. "The average size of the store will span across 300 and all the offerings have been competitively priced as we are targeting the masses," he stated. The brand is expecting stores to reach the breakeven point in the 18-24 months of operation. "From our second year of operations, we plan to enter online as well," he said. The brand is eyeing to open 5 stores by this fiscal year's end. Currently, Carvel has a presence in over five countries with more than 400 stores. Going ahead, Unify Foodworks also plans to introduce Rubio's Coastal Grill in India by this fiscal year's end. It will be renamed as Moe's Casa Mexicana.
Time of India
09-07-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Mother Sparsh eyes 40-50% growth in FY26, sharp focus on skincare and omnichannel push
New Delhi: Premium baby and personal care brand Mother Sparsh is targeting a 40-50% revenue growth in FY26 after crossing Rs 150 crore in revenue in the last fiscal, said Himanshu Gandhi , Co-founder and CEO, Mother Sparsh in an interview with ETRetail. With a profitable track record, the company is now focusing on expanding its baby skincare portfolio and deepening its omnichannel presence while continuing to prioritise product innovation and conscious consumer engagement, Gandhi shared. Currently, the brand operates in three tightly focused categories—wipes, health & hygiene, and baby skincare—and has no plans for wide portfolio expansion. 'We want to scale the existing categories. Baby skincare, in particular, is where we see a lot of headroom,' Gandhi said. Mother Sparsh claims a dominant share in premium wipes, with that single category alone nearing Rs 100 crore in annual revenue. 'We're the only brand selling wipes at three times the cost of others in the market. The choice is not impulsive, it's a conscious buying decision by mothers who look for trust, not gimmicks,' Gandhi noted. Talking about the product innovation and strategies, 'Innovation plays a key role. It's not about adding dyes or optical brighteners, it's about understanding the real need and fulfilling it in the safest possible way,' he said. To drive adoption, sampling with communication remains central to the marketing approach. 'We've distributed over four to five million samples. When we do wipes sampling, we include clinical data showing why our wipes help prevent diaper rash. It's not just sampling, it's sampling with context,' he added. Despite being a digital-first brand, Gandhi said the goal is to become a true omnichannel player. Currently, 85% of Mother Sparsh's revenue comes from e-commerce, quick commerce, and its own D2C site, while 15% is from organized offline retail. 'In the next two years, we want to move to a 65:35 split between online and offline. That's where we are deploying funds towards retail expansion, sampling, and building brand awareness for our skincare range,' he said. The brand is also scaling presence in pharmacy chains, hypermarkets, and baby-specific stores, while tapping tier-2 cities aggressively. 'We're seeing strong demand shifts from tier 1 to tier 2, thanks to platforms like Zepto and Swiggy Instamart. City-level data confirms this trend,' he added. On profit margins, Gandhi shared, 'We're already priced higher than most Indian and global competitors. Our margins are healthy, and with scale, we expect them to improve further due to better control over raw materials and packaging costs. But we aren't increasing MRP just because of inflation as we want to grow responsibly.' Mother Sparsh positions itself as a sub-premium to premium brand and intends to stay that way. 'We never wanted to be a mass brand. We want to be known for integrity, functionality, and innovation,' Gandhi said. The internal target is to grow 30–40% year-on-year while maintaining profitability. 'We come from conventional families, we don't want to grow at the cost of losses. This is a long game for us,' he said.
Time of India
03-07-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Madhav Sheth's NxtQuantum aims to build a global brand from India, starts with affordable AI+ smartphones
Madhav Sheth is launching the AI+ smartphones in India and plans to capture the entry-level market space. Initially, it is eyeing to capture 2-3 per cent of the total smartphone market in India, which currently stands at 150 to 160 million handsets a year, Madhav Sheth, founder & CEO of NxtQuantum Shift Technologies, told ETRetail. Sheth is planning to build a global brand from India. "At present, in terms of marketing and functionality, there are 4-5 dominant brands offering products in India, but many of them are essentially backed by the same family or ecosystem. So, ideally, it is a monopolistic or duopolistic market," he stated. He said, around 80 per cent market share is controlled by, and out of that, one group alone controls more than 65 to 70 per cent market share. So, we saw the opportunity to break that monopoly. "Secondly, there is a clear purpose here. Most products have been designed for other markets and simply brought to India. There has always been overlapping specs or features, assuming demand would follow, because India is seen as a consumption economy. However, I believe the real base of 2G users in India wants to move to smartphones, and even many 4G users still do not have good options at the entry-level," he further added. The brand is launching 2 models - Pulse and Nova 5G - in five colors, starting from Rs 5,000 onwards. "We are sharp on pricing. We prefer a direct-to-retail model over multilayered distribution, which involves incentivizing middlemen and setting up expensive promotion structures. We have started with our website, where retailers can participate directly, and we will supply to them from the brand itself," he asserted. The brand is launching through 10,000 retailers directly. It will also have online exclusives through Flipkart and other platforms. Initially, it is eyeing 70 per cent of its revenue to be contributed by online channels and the remaining 30 per cent to come from offline channels. "However, that could shift as we build offline distribution," he said. After these two phones, it will be launching more ecosystem products and two more phones this year. Highlighting the other revenue models, he said, "The hardware is being commoditized. The bigger vision is software and OS - especially with a focus on data privacy. We are also launching an App Store and building a complete monetization ecosystem around the OS." "Initially, the revenue split will be 70 per cent hardware and 30 per cent services. Over time, we expect a 50-50 split," he further added. The brand, which has spent $9-10 million in R&D, will be designing and manufacturing the products in India as it has developed its own OS, firewalls, data encryption, etc, in the country itself. "Even the core servers from Google are based here in Delhi and Mumbai," he said. "We have partnered with a manufacturer and have set up a facility in Noida with 12-16 assembly lines. The capacity of the unit stands at 12,000 to 15,000 units per day, and currently, we are using about 8,000 to 10,000 units daily," he explained. The brand, which plans to play the economies-of-scale game, has already booked orders of 2 million units, amounting to Rs 1,450 crore. "We are already operating at a very tight margin of around 5 per cent and going ahead, we plan to build a global brand from India," he asserted. By the end of this fiscal year, the brand plans to foray into at least 7-8 South Asian countries.
