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JioMart sees jump in orders via WhatsApp

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In August last year, Jiomart and WhatsApp announced the integration of the online shopping platform via the social messaging app. (Photo: Reuters)

NEW DELHI: JioMart the online commerce play of Reliance Retail registered a jump in quarterly orders via WhatsApp apart from an uptick in active customer base, top executives at the company said.

In August last year, Jiomart and WhatsApp announced the integration of the online shopping platform via the social messaging app. The move aimed to provide an end-to-end shopping experience on WhatsApp, allowing shoppers to browse the JioMart catalog, add products to their cart and pay to complete purchases—within WhatsApp. The integration, first announced in 2021, was part of a strategic partnership between Meta and Jio Platforms. Meta is a significant minority investor in Jio Platforms.

“JioMart on WhatsApp which was the partnership that was announced last quarter that continues to do well. The active customer base is growing 37% month on month, so very strong growth coming there. The order value and the number of orders continues to grow, orders have now grown 9x since the launch. So, this platform is helping us really democratize WhatsApp reach to and the new customers who are otherwise not being able to shop on digital platform,” Gaurav Jain, head, Strategy and Business Development, Reliance Retail Limited said during RIL’s post earnings call on 20 January.

Jain said that JioMart did well during the three months ended 31 December; demand from tier two and beyond towns grew faster when compared to the metros.

Overall for Reliance Retail—digital and new commerce businesses continue to remain strong, daily orders have grown 30% year on year. Partnerships with kiranas and merchant partners have scaled up 70% year-on-year, the company said.

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Reliance Retail is the country’s largest organized retailer with presence across categories such as consumer electronics, apparel, footwear, grocery, and general merchandise. Its digital and new commerce play includes both business-to-business online commerce platforms for consumers as well as business-to-business channels.

On JioMart, Jain said the platform expanded its catalogue 71% quarter-on-quarter—this is also helping in the greater contribution of the non-grocery category. “And a big part of that is also coming from the seller base which is getting expanded 83% on a quarter-on-quarter basis. These sellers are small, medium enterprises and artisans which are really helping us augment our product offerings in a very unique manner,” Jain said.

Meanwhile, during the December quarter the company’s grocery business led the growth—reporting 65% growth on a year-on-year. “Our focus on delivering a unique and improve customer shopping experiences is in place as we continue to premiumize our assortment, bringing more wider choice both from grocery as well as our non-grocery categories that has continued to also drive our average values across the business…On the digital commerce business, we saw a huge uptick in traffic. Milk Basket which is the subscription service that grew double over period as compared to last year as it extended its reach to 20 markets,” Jain said.

Within the grocery retail business—the company added 11 new fulfillment centres during the December quarter in line with its efforts to onboard a wider set of merchants and expand across geographies on the digital side.

Commenting on the overall operating environment, Jain said all of the retailer’s stores distribution, fulfilment and procurement centres, processing centres, offices, and facilities are operating at pre-covid levels of efficiency.“Customers have started to come back into stores for shopping. This being the first festive period post the impact of covid has been… we have seen a sharp rise in footfalls and during this quarter, we have seen over 201 million customers who have come into various stores,” Jain said.

Jain, however added that discretionary purchases were impacted in the month of November.

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