Reliance Retail is ready with ecommerce fireworks | Economic Times

Reliance Retail is the most aggressive in placing festive season orders this year to drive most of the business through its ecommerce ventures - Ajio, Jiomart and the webstore of Reliance Digital - in its first major attempt to win market share from rivals like Amazon and Walmart-owned Flipkart Group, multiple senior executives of leading brands said.The executives said the order volume from Reliance has increased between 70% and 400% from that of last festive season year as compared to 40-70% placed by the sellers in Amazon and Flipkart. The online festive season sales, which starts from Navratri and goes on till Dhanteras, is the largest revenue grosser in Indian ecommerce, accounting for nearly half of the annual business. An email sent to Reliance Retail remained unanswered till press time Wednesday.Reliance is targeting over 50% growth in Ajio and wants to reach half the size of online fashion market leader Flipkart-Myntra combined this Diwali.In electronics and groceries, it is aiming at two times growth over last year and wants to become the market leader in groceries. While manufacturers have flagged challenges in supplies for smartphones and electronics, Reliance is still hopeful to grow banking on higher order volume and its exclusive brands like BPL, Kelvinator and upcoming affordable smartphone JioPhone Next."Last year, Reliance started focusing on ecommerce and it was still evolving. This will be the first year when its ecommerce platforms have been scaled up, have a wider nationwide presence and all the brick-and-mortar stores have been enabled for omni-channel sales. Hence, Reliance is going all out. There are supply issues in electronics, hence the maximum focus is on fashion and groceries," said an industry executive.Ajio is Reliance's fashion ecommerce venture, while JioMart is the umbrella marketplace for grocery, value fashion, electronics and a few other categories. The electronics retail chain Reliance Digital has set up its own app and webstore.Another executive said Ajio had clocked sales of around ₹2,900 crore last fiscal, whereas this year, in the April-June quarter itself, it has crossed ₹1,000 crore despite the lockdown. Reliance expects Ajio should reach almost ₹4,500 crore sales this fiscal, he said. JioMart is expected to clock ₹3,000 crore.Also Read: Reliance plans to unveil super app adding Just Dial offerings