Flipkart shares new data on how the Indian heartland is turning into a big business for the e-commerce giant

• The Walmart-owned Indian e-tail giant continues to place its focus on India’s Tier 2 and Tier 3 markets.
• Termed as ‘Bharat’, the segment is being targeted by all major retailers to capitalise on India’s next 200 million internet users for the next phase of growth.
• Flipkart said that it has seen a staggering 65% new user growth from Tier 3 markets after the COVID-19 lockdown restrictions were lifted.

Walmart-owned Flipkart has its eyes set on India’s Tier-2 and Tier-3 markets, which is increasingly becoming a favourite for all online retailers in the country.

Termed as ‘Bharat’, the segment is being targeted by all major retailers to capitalise on India’s next 200 million internet users for the next phase of growth. Flipkart today said that it has seen a staggering 65% new user growth from Tier 3 markets after the COVID-19 lockdown restrictions were lifted.

Looking at Bharat, the company has made several developments. Earlier in June 2020, Flipkart had added three new vernacular languages in addition to the use of Hindi and English on its platform – Tamil, Telugu and Kannada. “This year, the adoption of native languages saw a 2.5x increase from pre-COVID* to the festive period* (January to November 2020),” said the company.

The e-commerce giant also defined the trends post lockdown to talk about the emergence of a new segment called “new essentials”, which it defined as essential goods for daily use as well as for work and remote learning.

Most in-demand product segments according to Flipkart

“As India’s homegrown e-commerce marketplace, our efforts continue to be dedicated to making e-commerce inclusive for every customer, irrespective of where they are located. This past year, we have strived to expand our offerings across categories to ensure our consumers are well equipped with everything that they need. We have consistently worked towards creating an ecosystem that serves consumers’ growing needs and also helping Indian sellers and MSMEs access the pan-India market more effectively & efficiently,” said Rajneesh Kumar, Chief Corporate Affairs Officer, Flipkart Group in a statement.

In the post lockdown period, Flipkart has also seen an uptick in the number of sellers on its platform – a 35% increase in sellers onboarded in 2020 with most of sellers coming from tier 2 and tier 3 regions such as Tirupur, Howrah, Zirakpur, Hisar, Saharanpur, Panipat and Rajkot.

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