Search platform Askme enters grocery segment; launches in Delhi-NCR

Askme, a local search listing platform for SMBs, has entered the hyper-local grocery segment. The company initially launched the service in Delhi NCR on Tuesday but plans to expand into 27 cities in the next four to six months.

The entry into the grocery segment is a rationale move post acquisition of grocery start-up Bestatlowest.com in May. With this, the start-up’s co-founders Ankit Jain and Amit Nigam, along with 25 other members, had joined Askme. With that, Askme has access to retailers and supermarkets in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh.

Manav Sethi, Group CMO and Head (Digital Strategy), Askme, said, “Leveraging the hyper-local model of sourcing, and zero costs on inventory or warehousing, brings significant advantage of pricing and portfolio. “This model is extremely flexible and rapidly scalable in adding more merchants and SKUs (stock keeping units), as demand grows. Delhi-NCR now boasts of 30 hyper-local hubs with 25,000+ SKUs.”

Askme is also building high transaction and consumption-led verticals across fashion, wellness, education, travel, and food, with a unique advantage of local contextual commerce, while consuming content across blogs, images, articles and videos.

It has launched a similar platform in Malaysia and is looking at launching across South Asia and South East Asia.

Grocery in India is evolving, as consumers are changing buying patterns. Growing mobile and Internet consumption on smartphones is leading to the growth of hyper-local grocery apps that promise delivery of goods in less than 2 hours.

There are over a dozen hyper-local grocery apps in the Indian grocery market, which is the sixth largest in the world, according to retail consultancy Technopak.

According to Research firm IGD predictions, India’s online grocery market, estimated to be less than $100 million at present, is expected to cross $25 billion by 2020 and by 2016, would overtake Japan to become the third-largest market with an annual growth of 25-30 per cent.

While, start-ups such as PepperTap, ZopNow, and Grofers are expanding with funds from private equity firms, Godrej Group’s premium food products retailer Nature’s Basket acquired Mumbai-based online grocery store Ekstop.com and integrated it into Nature’s Basket’s online store early this year.