- Reliance JioMart is rumored to be Reliance’s take on the likes of Flipkart and Amazon
- JioMart is said to be in its pilot testing phase at the moment
Reliance might start retailing consumer electronics and smartphones using its newest venture JioMart starting 26 January 2020. A report by Business Insider India noted that the pilot phase for retailing smartphones and consumer electronics will be launched in parts of Mumbai, Maharasthra.
Interestingly, Reliance has silently launched JioMart as a grocery retail platform, about seven days ago. The report also highlighted the fact that Reliance has started calling pre-registrations from users. Reliance is offering savings of as much as Rs 3,000.
Amazon and Flipkart’s arena
The e-commerce or the online channel for retailing smartphones and consumer electronics in India has presence of heavyweights like Amazon and Flipkart. While Amazon is a globally-known brand, Flipkart is backed by the famous Walmart Group.
Both these giants had created records in terms of smartphone and consumer electronics sales during the 2019 festive-season-sales-period in India. These two, as per a RedSeer Consulting Report, had generated about Rs 19,000 crores in Gross Merchandising Value (GMV) during the 2019-festive-season-sale.
The report also stated that Flipkart had led the festive sales in GMV terms with 60 to 62 per cent gross GMV. Amazon saw a 22 per cent Year-on-Year (YoY) growth in terms of GMV but the volume growth was more than 30 per cent.
Consumer electronics’ sales growing online
Mobile phones and consumer electronics contributed to a major portion of the sales because of a few seasons. Key factors that led to huge sales in mobile phones and other consumer good electronics were strong value prices, high EMI adoption and a variety in terms of range according to the report.
Sales of home and kitchen appliances, as per Amazon India, grew 8X, during the festive sales period. Customers bought one mixer grinder every three seconds and one iron every 4.5 seconds during the event. Cold pressed slow juicers also saw a growth of 450 per cent YoY alongside. The company further said that twice as many TVs were purchased during this time than festive season 2018.
