BigBasket joins quick commerce bandwagon, launches 10-20 minutes delivery
Premium- bbnow offers 10-20-minute deliveries, while bbexpress offers deliveries within an hour
Tata group-owned online grocery seller BigBasket has entered the quick-commerce segment through its under-20 minutes bbnow and under 60 minutes bbexpress across cities, joining the likes of Swiggy, Dunzo, Blinkit and Zepto.
“bbnow offers 10-20-minute deliveries within a 1.5-2.5 km radius with access to inventory comprising over 3000 products. bbexpress offers deliveries within an hour for consumers within a 6-km radius with a choice of over 8000 products," the firm said in a statement.
The online supermarket firm has built a massive delivery network across India along with a chain of 90 offline operational stores. “There are plans to have about 700 more in place by the year-end. BigBasket endeavours to cover the entire spectrum of grocery retail including quick-commerce, physical stores, alongside online grocery sales through the main BigBasket platform," the firm said.
Quick-commerce services have proliferated in India’s e-commerce ecosystem with promises of instant and rapid delivery of groceries and other items of daily use. Companies typically set up dark-stores or partner with local grocery stores to service orders in under 15 minutes.
The sector has seen the entry of new firms and has seen existing players such as Zepto, Blinkit (earlier known as Grofers), as well as Swiggy Instamart ramp up speedy supplies.
“Apart from consumers who plan and buy their monthly groceries from BigBasket, there is a huge user base comprising those who make unplanned purchases, top-ups and impulse purchases. For impulse and emergency purchases, the bbnow service with its 10-20-minute delivery window is a great option, and for unplanned buyers who are not in extreme haste, we have bbexpress delivery within an hour of order placement," said Hari Menon, Co-Founder and CEO, BigBasket.
Instead of relying on third-party stores to deliver, BigBasket says it has built its own network of dark stores. BigBasket’s aim is to deliver as many products as possible, in a safe and logical timeframe to consumers across India.
There is no cap on the number of products that one can order through these platforms, but typical order sizes average between 3-5 products and around ₹400 for the quick commerce deliveries. BigBasket uses a mix of technology, market understanding and innovation to create effective and consumer-oriented solutions.
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Currently, the firm operates across 40 cities in India, recording about 15 million customer orders per month. In 2020, it had reached $1 billion in annual revenues.
Last year in May, Tata Sons‘ subsidiary Tata Digital acquired a majority stake in Supermarket Grocery Supplies (SGS), the parent and business-to-business (B2B) operator of e-grocer BigBasket, providing exits for at least two early institutional backers including Alibaba Group and Actis LLP.
Bengaluru-based BigBasket’s investors include Helion Ventures, CDC, Bessemer Venture Partners and South Korea’s Mirae Asset Venture Investments.
In February, BigBasket acquired the enterprise business unit of a deep-tech company Agrima Infotech incubated by Kerala Startup Mission (KSUM).