E-commerce

Swiggy seeks a breakout category in high-speed grocery delivery

Aditi Shrivastava

April 14, 2021 | 6 Min Read

The company is betting on its virtual convenience store Instamart to unlock value beyond meal deliveries, adding to its core business that's rapidly recovering from a major slump last year

Grocery delivery is set to enter warp speed. Dropping from 30-45 minutes for a delivery now to 20 minutes or even 15 in dense clusters. That’s Swiggy’s ambition for its on-demand grocery delivery service Instamart, a category that, if done right, can be potentially bigger than its core meal delivery business.

“People should be shocked by how fast your grocery can arrive,” said a senior executive at Instamart.

Swiggy started Instamart in August, amid pandemic restrictions that had people either calling neighborhood stores for daily essentials or buying groceries online—a rather acquired habit for many. Now it’s planning to scale it up, with speed as its USP.

With Instamart, Swiggy has achieved about 13,000 daily orders across Gurugram and Bengaluru, mostly meeting internal expectations. This year, Swiggy plans to expand Instamart to Hyderabad, Mumbai, Chennai, Pune and Kolkata, and touch 100,000 orders, said an investor in the company.

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