Interview: Sadashiv Nayak, CEO, Big Bazaar – Future Retail

Apart from reducing down media spends considerably, now we have slashed our stock to 20-25%, to allow working capital, says Nayak

Huge Bazaar forayed into on-line commerce in April this 12 months. Regardless of its reasonably belated entry, the retail chain goals to remodel into an “developed retail ecosystem” given its expansive offline presence. Sadashiv Nayak tells Sheena Sachdeva how Huge Bazaar is engaged on gaining an edge over the extra established e-grocery gamers out there.

Having entered the net grocery market reasonably late, how does Huge Bazaar plan to meet up with the likes of BigBasket and Grofers who command sizable market share right this moment?

Grocery is a rising section within the nation. Each fashionable commerce, which has 13-14% penetration and e-commerce, with 2-3% share, are rising. We don’t see this as competitors, however actually as a possibility. There may be big headroom to develop, not only for grocery, but additionally for meals, homecare, private care, and many others, on-line.

As in comparison with established gamers within the on-line grocery market, we’re fairly small. Nonetheless, the prevailing gamers usually are not in additional than 15-20 areas. Our optimism comes from the truth that we’re enhancing our stock in 285 shops of Huge Bazaar at one go. Firms within the section have specialised in a specific stock mannequin. Nonetheless, now we have opened up all our stock together with meals, homecare, private care, electronics, and many others. Whereas new to the channel of e-commerce, we’re previous when it comes to serving prospects, with an expertise of twenty years. Future Group has a stronghold as a consequence of its 30 million customers. It’s nearly making folks comfy and accustomed to on-line retail. The concept is to serve the rising consumption within the business.

Store2Door targets tier II markets the place kirana shops have a stronghold. What logistics and stock administration initiatives have you ever applied to sort out this?

Huge Bazaar already has a presence in tier II markets. Now we have our shops within the smallest cities within the nation. Nonetheless, with sufficient grocery and kirana shops, Huge Bazaar’s on-line channel with a number of segments can be new to smaller cities. Huge Bazaar has a wholesome hub-and-spoke mannequin for its provide chain. We work by algorithms for each merchandise. For the brand new channel, we’re working laborious to make the merchandise brisker and allow each day enterprise for the shop. This has opened avenues for us to cross-populate the merchandise primarily based on the purchasers’ preferences.

Are WhatsApp and phone-based retailing sustainable in the long run?

Sure. Now we have enabled WhatsApp to an unique vary of consumers, primarily senior residents, households affected by Covid and disabled folks. Now we have began a missed-call service for simple procuring. We’re engaged on a wholesome mixture of chatbots, IVR calls and AI to unravel prospects’ doubts, as a result of whereas prospects are largely accustomed to the expertise, some hesitate to work together with an app or a web site on the first occasion.

Prior to now, your retail codecs Future Bazaar and Huge Bazaar Direct have needed to shut store. What went mistaken?

None of those experiments had been a failure, as a result of they’ve helped us to make our basis sturdy. BB Direct was an try in direction of assisted commerce throughout 2013 when e-commerce didn’t exist; the primary pilot was within the Vidarbha area of Nagpur. By way of this initiative, we realised that any transition to expertise wants help. We made errors in cataloguing and within the presentation of the merchandise. We realised that small cities want far more than reductions; familiarity, for example. These learnings have come in useful. We now know precisely what the wants of small cities are.

Future Retail’s losses have been widening. What are a number of the focus areas of the corporate to spur progress?

We’re addressing the chance reasonably than the books. As a result of disruption final 12 months, we try to remain leaner and meaner, and reduce prices. Apart from reducing down media spends considerably, now we have slashed our stock to 20-25%, to allow working capital. We goal to attain our pre-Covid numbers within the subsequent quarter. However a number of variables usually are not in our management.

We imagine the e-commerce channel has potential so as to add one other 20% to our revenues inside six to 12 months, together with a secure turnover. Huge Bazaar is poised to change into a perfect retail ecosystem.

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