Flipkart Wholesale spreading footprint

In a bid to assist kiranas across India, Flipkart Wholesale, the digital B2B marketplace, has announced its plans to more than triple its geographical footprint in the country to close to 2,700 cities. It aims to make business easier and bring prosperity to lakhs of small businesses and kiranas.

The marketplace was launched in September 2020 and from then it has witnessed strong growth in the first half of 2021. E-commerce adoption by kiranas on Flipkart Wholesale doubled in January-June this year compared to last year. This is projected to see 180 per cent growth in July-December 2021, as against the same period last year.

The Wholesale has also seen a surge in suppliers that have come onboard on the digital B2B marketplace. The supplier base is expected to grow 58 per cent in 2021, which will further boost the local business ecosystem as well as livelihoods.

Adarsh Menon, senior vice-president and head, Flipkart Wholesale, said, "we launched Flipkart Wholesale with an aim to bring prosperity to the B2B retail ecosystem and solve local pain points of kiranas across the country. Despite challenges induced by the pandemic, we have seen a strong response from kiranas who are now realizing the benefits of digitization and warming up to e-commerce as the go-to means of purchase. We will continue to leverage the technology strengths from the Flipkart group and enhance livelihoods and local supplier ecosystems across the country." Flipkart Wholesale witnessed 17 per cent growth in its kirana customer base in January-June 2021 compared to the same period last year.The kirana customer base is projected to further grow by 33 per cent in July-December 2021, compared to the same period last year. Kiranas will continue to be Flipkart Wholesale's most important customer segment and will get access to an even better product assortment at great prices, credit offers, payment options and end-to-end service via feet-on-street associates, app and cash-and-carry stores.