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Indian women to fuel $3bn e-shopping by ’16
To
Account For 35% Of Market As Apparel, Jewellery Sales Spike Online: Accel
Report
Mumbai/Bangalore: Indian women fuelled online shopping worth over half a
billion dollars last year with the figure expected to gallop five-fold to
$3 billion in the next three years. Women influenced sales are projected to
be 35% of the overall Indian e-commerce market — estimated at $8.5 billion
— by 2016, marquee venture capital firm Accel Partners, one of the most
prolific backers of local startups, said in a report shared exclusively
with TOI.
These projections come in the backdrop of a
frenetic growth in internet penetration through smartphones and women
lapping up the convenience of shopping online. The Indian e-commerce
industry totaled $2 billion in the last calendar year, with
women-influenced sales at $511 million, or at 26% of the overall market.
India’s internet users would double to 400 million
in three years, with 70% new users expected to be added through mobile
devices. The core online shoppers will be roughly 10% of the internet base,
at 40 million, by 2016. Their average purchase value would climb from the
current Rs 1,860 to Rs 3,600 in three years.
The huge contribution by women to the e-commerce
market — excluding travel, ticketing and food ordering — contrasts the
brick-andmortar retailers who derive maximum sales from men even in
categories like fashion and apparel. Last year, fashion e-commerce sales
doubled to $559 million compared to the previous year and will potentially
go up to about $2.8 billion by 2016, rivaling electronics and mobiles that
have traditionally been the biggest draw online.
“Women are emerging as a strong customer base for
us, having grown from contributing 20% to our overall sales two years back
to now clocking 40% of sales. The offline fashion and apparel industry has
been dominated by offerings for men. We expect women will contribute 50-55%
sales in the next two years as we increase our private label presence,”
said Mukesh Bansal, co-founder of Myntra.
Facebook investor Accel said working women clicking
online increased 43% and formed roughly 10% of the active internet user
base in India. Prashanth Prakash, partner at Accel Partners, said Indian
women are embracing the concept of fast fashion online, which hasn’t been
the case offline. “Apparel, jewellery, home decor and baby products are some
of the categories which have seen exponential growth in the last two
years,” he said.
Domestic e-commerce will witness a compounded
annual growth of 63% in the next three years considering the huge headroom
for growth. Consider this: Online sales are just 1% of the $43-billion
fashion, accessories and footwear market; 0.2% of the $45-billion jewellery
market; 7% of book sales; and 4% of mobile phone and tablet shipments.
“Devices like smartphones and tablets are taking
more women to e-commerce. This is more relevant to some of the private
purchase categories like lingerie, which is shifting online in a big way.
These devices also provide women an option to indulge in recreational,
relaxed shopping,” said Richa Kar, founder of Zivame, an online lingerie
store which recently raised $10 million in funding.
About 9% of domestic ecommerce traffic came through
mobile devices last year, reporting an eight-fold jump. Mobile-driven
shopping stood at around 10% of China’s $106-billion e-commerce industry.
The rapid adoption of mobiles for online shopping will open up newer forms
of payment options. Use of mobile wallets, popular in China, is likely to
gain momentum here too, the Accel report said.
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