Your neighborhood Kirana store goes online – Lyfekart.com

While India’s eCommerce market is expected to grow 50 percent in the next five years, according to Economic Survey 2014-15. The regular Brick & Mortar (B&M) stores in your neighborhood are going hitech with entering the online model.

Groceries sell irrespective of the state of the economy. You can stop going to the cinema and restaurants, but there’s no way you can live without toothpaste, soap and, well, vegetables. Caught in the city’s fast pace, tedious commuting and long working hours, many consumers don’t have the time to buy groceries or would like to avoid the chore.

We caught up with the promoters of Lyfekart.com, the first generation entrepreneurs who already into the Groceries business since 38 years.

Pawar Stores on Deshmukh road has realized this opportunity and started an online grocery store named – Lyfekart.com

AAB caught up with founders of Lyfekart.com Ritesh Pawar, Saurabh Pawar & Shriprasad Kulkarni.

Ritesh Pawar has a strong background managing retail business and leading all retail efforts. Ritesh’s MBA in retail and rich experience was key to create an online grocery business which is the backbone of the online store. Realizing the need for a great online grocery buying experience of tech savvy folks in Belgaum and catering to the need of this audience for swift, quality an unmatched customer experience, the idea of diversifying the in-store business to online store was thought by Ritesh.

Saurabh Pawar’s experience in ecommerce and analytics was essential to create the site and technology for delivering the online experience. Having experience in managing online customer experience based on AB testing, customer research, data analysis, Saurabh was able to help in creating the site which will be under continuous improvement to make it more efficient.

Shriprasad Kulkarni believes in the idea of the online grocery store. Based on endless discussions of serving the need for the customers who would need an online service to provide great service, Shriprasad is great at mobilizing resources and efforts quickly. Based on his previous job experiences, Shri’s expertise and bringing high levels of efficiencies to some of the core processes.

A combination of various skills and a lot of help from a lot of well-wishers, friends has helped them create Lyfekart.com

Why you decided to start Lyfekart.com ?

Lyfekart.com ––> This started since our MBA days. We studied the concepts of retailing in Bangalore. We identified that people of Belgaum will need an experience which needs to match something offered in bigger cities. Many people want a way to help parents with their groceries and other things by doing things online by sitting in Bangalore or Boston. As we already had the experience in retailing groceries, we thought of taking it to the next step and providing that platform launched a website. People can place orders from mobile phones, desktops, call us. We want to deliver great quality at great prices and make it really easy. We are always looking to make things easy for the customer. We know the value of great customer service and human interaction in providing service to customers, being online is just adding the convenience, but our main strength is great service humanly possible.

You left your job and came over to start this – why?

Lyfekart.com ––> We always wanted to enter into business. Hence, I started my career with a start-up in Bangalore. We learnt the challenges and opportunities as I was handling all the action along with the core team. We were just waiting for the right opportunity and time and finding a team which can help me fulfill want for setting up a business. Getting to do it with a great team and wanting to do this to solve a need is always great.

What if you fail in this venture?

Lyfekart.com ––> We truly believe there is a need for shopping online groceries. We already have made deliveries. As someone really smart (Mark Zuckerberg) said, one of the greatest risk is not taking a risk at all. You are guaranteed to fail if you are not taking a risk when things are constantly changing. By doing what we have a passion for at least we will not have any regrets. We are young and want to learn if this experience offers a great learning opportunity, we believe we have nothing to lose.

We have not thought of any plans if this does not work. We believe in this concept and are trying to make it successful. But as of now, we stick to our belief.

Do you really think the online store concept will work in a city like Belagavi?

Lyfekart.com ––> Yes! It’s a big yes, we have already delivered and have people liking the experience and the concept. We observed the shopping pattern has changed in recent times. The way people use mobile devices to perform many tasks, online shopping for groceries will soon be one of them, we just don’t want to limit to groceries but want to provide a lot of content to make lyfekart a great website to engage and experience a great service. Therefore, Belgaum is not left behind when it comes to shopping online. We want to have everyone coming to our online store, students, professionals, moms, grand-moms and we want to make it easy for them to buy. Hence, we believe the concept will be well received in Belgaum where people eager to try out and readily adapt to new trends.

What are the plans for delivery of goods?

Lyfekart.com ––> We are currently catering to the needs of Belgaumites. We start our services as early as 7.00 am until 8.00 pm. We have two delivery slots; orders received before 3.00 PM will be delivered the same day and orders received after 3.00 PM will be delivered the next day. We confirm the availability of customers before delivery of goods which helps the customers as well as our delivery team.

Belagavi already has a couple of online grocery stores, so how will your entry affect the market?

Lyfekart.com ––> In any given market there are competitors. When we started our discussions we did not know that there exist any online grocery stores at all let alone in Belgaum. So when we learnt that there are people already running such business, it gave us a comfortable feeling rather than a threat. We were confident that this will be well received in the market. Our entry will move more consumers into the online shopping arena. We want that to happen and we are happy that we entered the market at the right time. With multiple players it is also help in overcoming problems and learning from each other’s mistakes.