Ease of doing business for MSMEs: The latest survey by consultancy firm RedSeer on the e-commerce festive season has reported that three in four sellers recorded at least 2x volume growth from their business as usual during sale days (September 22-October 23) with strong support from e-commerce platforms. The survey involving 149 respondents said 2-3x jump was reported by 25 per cent of respondents in mobiles and electronics while 42 per cent of sellers saw 3-5 growth in fashion sales. Likewise, 36 per cent and 31 per cent of sellers reported 2-3x sales jump in large appliances and home & kitchen products respectively during the festive period.
Meanwhile, online retail achieved around Rs 76,000 crore of sales during the one-month festive sale event, up around 25 per cent year-on-year (YoY) from the year-ago festive sale month. On the other hand, the shopper base increased by around 1.26x YoY with around 64 per cent of shoppers coming from Tier 2 and beyond cities. During the festive month, 115 -125 million shoppers had placed orders across e-commerce platforms aided by Tier 2 and beyond cities.
Among categories, out of 404 shoppers surveyed, 71 per cent purchased products in the fashion category followed by electronics (58 per cent), mobiles (42 per cent), etc. Flipkart, Amazon, Meesho, Myntra, Shopsy and other online retail platforms were tracked for recording the e-commerce performance this festive season.
Importantly, the online seller growth in the country had outpaced the e-retail market growth, with the number of sellers increasing by 35 per cent annually. According to a study by management consulting firm Bain & Company and Flipkart in October this year, while the online seller base grew by 35 per cent during 2020-21, 40 per cent of the new sellers came from tier-II or smaller cities.
Overall India’s e-retail market is likely to jump 3X to $150–$170 billion by 2027 from $50 billion in 2022. In 2021, the market stood at $40 billion. This implied 25–30 per cent annual growth and a doubling of market penetration to 9–10 per cent over the next five years, the report noted.
To enable more businesses to sell online, the government in June this year had announced waiving the mandatory registration for businesses supplying goods intra-state via e-commerce with turnover up to Rs 40 lakh. The government however is yet to notify the changes.