X
    Categories: Ecommerce

Shoppers Stop Goes Online; Will Start By Selling Books and Grocery Through Online Store

Shoppers Stop Goes Online

K Raheja Corp Group backed Shoppers Stop has decided to embrace ecommerce is a massive way. Confirmed reports are coming in that their two flagship brands: Hypercity and Crossword would be now converted into online store, which means that users can now buy their products both offline and online.

Does this mean that offline outlets would be scrapped? How much sales is expected via online medium for Shoppers Stop?

We explore..

Offline To Online Transformation for Shoppers Stop

Last October, Shoppers Stop had revealed their plans to become an omni-channel retail brand, and had invested Rs 60 crore to develop online platform and ecommerce backbone for Shoppers Stop.

Now, the same infrastructure will be used to convert their flagship brands HyperCity and Crossword into ecommerce portals.

Managing director Govind Shrikhande said, “Since we have already invested Rs 60 crore on the technology backbone for Shoppers Stop ecommerce venture, the incremental investment for taking HyperCity and Crossword online will be not much,”

Hypercity is Shoppers Stop’ grocery retail venture, and right now 19 outlets are present across 10 cities. Whereas Crossword is their books and toys centric retail venture, and 50 outlets exists across 15 cities.

While Hypercity’s online arm would only exist where they have physical outlets, Crossword’s online venture would be pan-India.

Trial has already started in Mumbai, which will be extended to Bengaluru by the end of this year.

Will Online Model Work for Shoppers Stop?

As per reports, Shoppers Stop will integrate all their 80 stores, into one uniform ecommerce infrastructure, and enable selling of branded products from companies like MAC, Estee Lauder, Clinique and Bobbi Brown via their online platform.

As per Shrikhande, Shoppers Stop will enable 10% of their overall sales via ecommerce segment. He said, “We expect almost 10% of our sales for Shoppers Stop to be generated from e-commerce in three years. We will at most have two season old merchandise on the platform under discount as compared to 3-4 season old on other fashion portals,”

Besides providing their users with a new channel for shopping, Shoppers Stop’s online expansion is also due to cost cutting measures. They have already reduced their total retail space from 15 lakh sq feet to 13 lakh sq feet. Three Shoppers Stop outlets were recently shut down.

Do you think Shoppers Stop would be able to compete with existing ecommerce players? Do let us know by commenting right here!

Mohul Ghosh: Mohul keenly observes the nuances of Indian startup world; and tries to demystify the secrets behind Technology, Marketing, Mobile and Internet. He is a Writer by passion, Marketer by choice and Entrepreneur by compulsion. Follow him on Twitter here: @_mohul
Related Post