It's safe to say that, today, we're all online shopping addicts. Flipkart, Snapdeal and Amazon are household names and the urban Indian middle class has a new favourite three-word phrase - 'Add to Cart'. Recognizing that the 300-million strong demographic has been tapped into, and then some, Snapdeal is looking to expand. Starting with Mumbai's Dharavi slum, one of the largest slums in the world. The e-commerce biggie has tied up with remittance provider FINO PayTech to make the world of online shopping a reality in semi-urban, rural and low-income residential areas, within the country. Dharavi, then, would be the perfect place to start, what with a million people residing in the slum's tightly packed shanties.
Except there's a catch -- building a dedicated consumer base in slum and rural areas might be more difficult than Snapdeal may have imagined. A FINO worker told The Financial Express that on most days the storefront sees only a couple of visitors. In contrast, the local store next door that sells subsidised gas does steadier business any given day.
In addition, education will have a very large role to play in ensuring the success of a venture like this. In essence it isn't that simple a plan. For Snapdeal to be able to create a customer base in a rural or a slum set-up, their potential buyers would minimally need the following: access to a computer or smartphone, internet and of course the ability to read.
Making health and wellness products so readily available would be a huge step forward, provided that the service is ACTUALLY availed of.