Amazon India is trying to capitalise the Indian buyers’ psyche by not limiting its services to ordering online and door-step delivery, but giving the buyer an option to collect the packet from a pick-up point at his/ her convenience.

The online store has piloted store pick-up facility at a number of cities across India. It has, since the launch of this facility just about a year ago, steadily increased the pick-up points from 20 at start to over 1100 across 50 cities, Noor Patel, Category Leader – Media, Amazon India, said.

The pick-up store is Amazon’s offline delivery points for goods ordered through Amazon.

The service is targeted at people who may not be available at their residence or office at delivery time. The pickup point/ store lets the buyer collect his/ her parcel from the selected location at their convenience, Patel explained.

Amazon India is looking to further strengthen this network.

“Small entrepreneurs, including kirana stores, bakeries, ticket-booking outlets, flower shops are part of this programme,” he said.

Kirana Now The company has, just a couple of weeks ago tweaked the pick-up store programme by launching “Kirana Now”, which is at present limited to Bengaluru, and the service offering - available only for five pin codes in Karnataka’s capital.

“To start with, we have restricted it to everyday essential. This kirana model service is targeted at home makers and those that prefer to order the essentials online and have the goods delivered at their door-step in 3 to 4 hours. We see lot of merit in the pilot run of this programme,” he said.

Tie-up with Inida Post It has tied up with Indian postal services as well to reach out to customers in remote locations. “Some of the locations do not figure even on Google Maps, but India Post, with its wide network of post offices across the country help reach out to remotest corners,” he said, adding “incidentally, India is the only market where we do cash on delivery.”

“Literacy level of the sellers is a challenge for us in India, but we have a Seller University Programme, where they are taught everything,” Madhavi Kochar, Amazon India, said.

The company has 12 fulfilment centres in the country. Patel hinted at opening up more such facilities in the coming days.

“Each of these has a storage capacity of 2.8 million cubic metres. We do not invest in land and structure, but on technology and processes.”

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