The move comes close on the heels of Reliance planninggrocery foray taking local kirana stores onboard.
Walmart-owned Flipkart has already established adelivery model using local kirana stores and onboarded some27,000 stores across 700 cities.
Now, Flipkart proposes to have authorised "buy zones"where a customer can walk in and check a product but he or shehas to order it online, a company official said on Thursday.
"Our pilot project was successful in Hyderabad withmobiles where we partnered with local kirana stores for atouch and feel experience. But the order has to be takenonline from a kiosk installed there," Flipkart chief corporateaffairs officer Rajneesh Kumar said.
Now, the e-commerce major plans to expand thislocalised partnerships in other parts of the country, he said.
Flipkart and Amazon now faces the heat of theCompetition Commission of India's probe against them foralleged malpractices including deep discounting and tie-upwith preferred sellers.
"Online market accounts for only 3 per cent of thetotal retail market in the country," Kumar said.
In fashion, tie-ups with local tailors had offeredhuge benefit to e-commerce company in a sharp reduction in thenumber of returns.
In the mobile category, pure online brands had movedto offline brick and mortar stores to expand its base andprotect their margins.
On Thursday, Flipkart organised a workshop for MSMEsin Kolkata, a part of a series of programmes to help theenterprises leverage e-commerce to grow their business.
Kumar said the move will help deepen base of productson the marketplace platform. BSMNN NN