E-fashion portal turns to kirana stores to boost delivery during big sale

The company is expecting an 8x sales over a normal day during this sale and has launched a unique augmented reality (AR) game to engage 5 lakh users ahead of the sale.

Myntra has seen a 50 per cent growth Y-o-Y as compared to the industry growth which is 30 per cent. Its overall market share in the e-commerce space is about 40 per cent, whereas its share in the branded space is close to 70 per cent.

Ananth Narayanan, CEO, Myntra-Jabong, said, “EORS 8 is prepped and ready to have over 11 million unique users for Myntra over 4 days. We are geared to handle 63 million sessions and expect to register a 40% growth over the previous June edition.  We have created the necessary infrastructure to increase delivery speed by 15% and have also doubled our Kirana network of stores to 7,500 spanning across 50 cities, thereby targeting to complete 90% deliveries within a week of the sale.”

As in the past, tier II and III cities and towns continues to be an important area of focus for Myntra with over 60% sales coming from these regions. Myntra is looking at acquiring 5 lakh new customers during the 4 day sale.  

Narayanan tells us, “On a normal day, Tier 2 cities comprise 55 to 60 per cent of online sales. Our own private brands like Roadster, contribute to 25 per cent of the business. One a normal day we deliver 150,000 odd packages. During the EORS which happens twice a year, the sales volumes exceeds 8x a day as compared to a Business as Usual (BaU) day. We anticipate that almost 60 per cent of sales will come from beyond the Top 10 cities. We are expecting 42 lakh shipments to be sent out during the sale, that’s around 5.5 lakh deliveries a day.”

He adds, “In the run up to the EORS, we have also come up with an augmented reality based game, almost like Pokemon Go. Within the Myntra app, you can find various brands floating around, which earn the user points for the sale. We also decided to reveal all the prices of all the items 3 days before the sale, to help customers wish-list their favourite products.”

Talking about the company’s foray into the offline and omni channel model, he says, “Opening offline stores is helping online sales. We already have two showrooms of our own fashion brand Roadster, the next one should be coming up in Pune. 

In two years, we want to take this number to 50, as well as open 50 stores for our other brands under the Myntra banner like HRX, All About You, Mast and Harbour. Roadster’s sales will cross Rs 600 cr this year.”

In fashion, we have a return rate of 20 to 25 per cent. Before GST, we would have to ship returns all the way back to Delhi warehouse, even if the product has been bought in Chennai. Thanks to GST we can do local restocking, which brings down the supply chain cost. 

•The overall fashion market is worth $100 bn. Overall online penetration of fashion in India is 3.5 per cent, which is $3.5 bn. In other parts of the world, it’s between 12 and 15 per cent. 

•The top selling product categories, of Myntra include sportswear, shoes and accessories, women’s ethnic wear, men’s casual wear and women’s wear. The new categories include beauty products, costume jewellery and soft home furnishing. 

•The company also has high hopes on the sales of its fitness band Blink and is planning to introduce more customer engagement initiatives like talking t shirts, based on augmented reality 

•Jabong will also be participating in EORS and is expecting 6x sales of a normal day.