Flipkart To Make Food Retail Play With FarmerMart

Flipkart is reportedly gearing up for the rollout of FarmerMart, a food business that would sell packaged food and locally produced products. While it’s not yet known if the company will have a digital shopping platform, it seems unlikely that the retailer would only use brick-and-mortar retail, given its intense focus on omnichannel and hybrid sales this past year, Inc42 reported.

At Flipkart’s board meeting in Singapore last month, FarmerMart was given the green light to register as a firm. It will reportedly sell directly to shoppers without the sellers that are found through Flipkart.

To comply with certain government rules for food retail, the company will need its own staff, board and inventory separate from Flipkart’s eCommerce business.

The Walmart-owned firm registered FarmerMart as a corporate entity on Oct. 4 following the government’s rule changes that enabled eCommerce marketplaces to sell directly to shoppers. The firm can now formally submit a food license application.

In separate news, Flipkart registered 50 percent growth in new users during its Big Billion Days sale. The firm saw 70 billion views during the first six days of the event, which began on Sept. 29. Year-over-year growth in smaller cities was 100 percent.

Flipkart Group CEO Kalyan Krishnamurthy said in a statement, according to earlier reports, “We take immense pride in making eCommerce more inclusive through the introduction of some top categories, which during this festive season have been able to cater to the needs of Tier 2 markets and beyond.” Flipkart also noted that roughly half of top sellers saw threefold growth and that 40 percent of transactions were from smaller towns.