Not just politicians, now offline & online stores target non-metros, villages of India

Our politicians often claim “I am a poor farmer”, other than owning farm lands not sure how many of them have ever done real farming.

Indian retail industry is about $43,500 crore, will grow to $84,000 crore by 2015 (Pitch Magazine, March 2011 issue). Offline retail stores like Marks & Spencer, which has an ‘unaffordable tag’, has been struggling to make its presence felt in India. Marks & Spencer is now planning on expanding to non-metros, Tier-2 towns. The ambiance of the stores in the small towns will be the same as their stores in metros.

The findings in the digital space are interesting. Urban India has about 6.8 crore TV homes & 6 core cable & satellite (C&S) homes. Rural India has 7.3 crore TV homes & 5.6 crore C&S homes. One in three C&S homes in rural India have turned digital as compared to one in seven C&S homes in urban India.

Ecommerce Goes To Rural India

Economic Times carried an article about the increase of ecom activity in non-metros and villages.

• Sites like Jumadi get 10% of their business from non-metros.
• Flipkart gets 50% of their sales from non-metros.
• Non-metro users are using credit cards and cash on delivery.
• According to eBay’s ecom study, 3,296 Indian cities shopped online in 2010. Of this, 2234 were Tier-2 & Tier-3 cities.
• Big brands don’t find it viable to open a shop in small towns, ecom is the perfect route to deliver their products to those whose can afford from non-metros.
• Buying power in smaller towns have increased, can’t ignore them anymore.
• Online banking usage in Feb 2010: 57% metros, 43% non-metros
• Online banking usage in Feb 2011: 48% metros, 52% non-metros
• However, when it comes to online payment, 70% are from metros.