E-Commerce India - Shop for shoes and socks (footwear) online

Who buys shoes and socks online? That would theoretically be lot of people - students, professionals and senior citizens; does that not cover the entire population who knows about shoes and socks? :-)

Way back in 80's and 90's, wearing 'canvas' shoes for playing sports at school was a big deal. Students used to get real sports shoes only after going to college. After brands like Reebok, Adidas and Nike arrived in India, there was no stopping of students from buying these brands. Just like any other products, cities were the starting point for shoe sales, but they penetrated into smaller towns also very fast.

Now the same shoes are available online as well in India. There are dedicated online shops which sell shoes only, like BeStylish or Fashos. The latter offers 'personalized' shoe store, which you can customize once and visit every time to check-out the latest that matches your preferences.

There are shoes-only online stores which turned into full-fledge online shopping malls like Yebhi.

There are other lifestyle e-commerce stores like Jabong and Myntra which sell footwear along with apparel and other items.

Branded companies like Bata and PUMA sell their exclusive footwear in their own online stores.

I really wonder how long it takes to get a correct pair of shoes by purchasing them online? As there is a return-offer from literally all the shoe stores, I can order 5 pairs and keep the one that I like most, returning the rest. But given so many variations like color, size, design, look & feel, what is the probability of someone liking what they order in the first instance?

With success of zappos.com in USA, the model of online stores in niche spaces like shoes has increased across the globe. Zappos has soared from zero sales in 1999 to 1 billion USD gross sales in 2009 and got acquired by Amazon. If anyone is interested in building their startup into a large-scale enterprise, they should read 'Delivering Happiness' by Tony Hsieh, CEO of then Zappos. It is not about rags-to-riches story, but about encouraging proper culture in an organization, which ultimately leads to delivering happiness to customers.

Talking about the niche areas in footwear industry, it is interesting to watch Footsy Design, a company which sells socks online. They design the socks, get them manufactured and sell only online right now. A niche space and a unique model brings socks for all occasions - day or night, office or home, indoor or outdoor - and age-group.

Thanks to these e-commerce stores, I am improving on 'footwear vocabulary' - ankle boots, loafer shoes, hiking shoes and ballerina shoes. It might take 6 months for me to get a hang of this vocabulary.

While the feet are getting so much of attention and choice, what about our head? Someone should be thinking about designing well-branded hats for all those last-mile logistics guys, chasing time to meet e-commerce customer requirements. For all those faces in the crowd - Hats Off !

Shop online for a pre-owned car anywhere in India

Gone are the days when people call them 'used cars'; the correct term is 'pre-owned car'. No one is hesitant to buy a pre-owned car if it suits their budget and other requirements and one gets a good bargain. But where would one buy or sell such pre-owned cars?

In earlier days, the cars are usually serviced in a local car care center. The one who understands about the health of a car is the mechanic, who handles the car regularly. He also doubles as a broker who can give hints and pointers - how much would the car sell for at any given point in time? who are the potential buyers? He can bring the sellers and buyers to the table for a discussion and negotiation.

With people moving to authorized service centers, at least two channels were possible to sell or buy pre-owned cars. One is the authorized service centers opening their own pre-owned car exchanges. The other model is for a 3rd party to open an exchange to support pre-owned cars from any vendor. While both the models are adopted in the market, the latter has become popular and come online too. Check out these sites for the concept.

1	http://carazoo.com
2	http://gaadi.com
3	http://motorexchange.in
4	http://carsingh.com
5	http://carnation.in
6	http://carwale.com
7	http://cartrade.com
8	http://preownedcars.in
9	http://cardekho.com

The passenger car brands are not far behind. Companies like Tata Motors and Mahindra have their own sites - http://tatamotorsassured.com and http://mahindrafirstchoice.com - which offer pre-owned cars purchase online.

Many of these sites also provide information about new cars, prices, reviews, insurance and dealers information.

I guess there are different models again in this domain. The retailers can  directly post their car-for-sale online in some of the sites. In a few sites, only the dealers are required to register and post the vehicles on their behalf. There are sites like cartradeexchange.com, where the cars are auctioned online.

Even if the car information is posted online for browsing by others, the buyer would need to physically see the vehicle before confirming the purchase. Obviously, this part of the transaction can only happen offline.

What next after shopping for cars online? How about setting up an online shop to buy autos, buses or even trucks? I bet those vehicles also would be sold online by 2020 if not earlier !