After delivering food across cities in India for 5 years, Food tech major Swiggy is piloting hyperlocal grocery delivery services through a separate app Swiggy Dash.
The delivery services are currently tested internally. The food major firm would deliver items from existing stores and not hold any inventory.
The dedicated app for grocery delivery will work through the partnership model, much similar to its food delivery process already in place. The delivery will be first launched in Gurugram in a few weeks. It plans to offer free deliveries up to 4 km radius from the stores.
The Bengaluru-based firm has tied up with many stores in the city. Swiggy Dash will offer products including groceries, meat, baby care, and pet supplies. The delivery charges are not known.
Like existing players Grofers and Bigbasket in grocery delivery segment, Swiggy will lists out items that can be purchased at a particular store.
In the last few years, online groceries has emerged as the next biggest online category after fashion and mobiles.
E-grocery is expected to be the fastest-growing segment in online retail and is expected to grow four-time over the next two years to Rs 100 billion in revenues, according to a Crisil report.
Whether its online retail major Flipkart or US e-tailer Amazon, both have been eyeing to grab bigger chunk in the segment. Amazon is running its grocery arm under Amazon Now. In August last year, Flipkart had launched grocery offering Flipkart Supermart in Bengaluru.
At present, Grofers and Bigbasket are two major players and dominate the grocery segment. Recently, Grofers said to have crossed Rs 310 crore in GMV and brought 2.5 lakh new customers to its platform during January, as per CEO of Grofers, Albinder Dhindsa. It now claims to have grown faster and closed in market share gaps with Bigbasket, which boasts of having over 50 per cent market.
Keeping the competition in mind, Swiggy would look to use its food delivery experience in grocery to make some dent. How it will pan out for Swiggy is a matter of time.
But if it clicks, may lead to create a new vertical for food tech major and soon be followed by its competitors Zomato, UberEats and Foodpanda.
The development was first reported by OfficeChai.
