- As of April 2018, Amazon India had a total of 67 fulfillment centers across 13 Indian states.
- The service is available exclusively for the Prime members with fastest 2-hour delivery slots for INR 49.
- Amazon Fresh will now be competing against Alibaba-backed BigBasket, SoftBank-backed Grofers, among other players.
Amazon has brought its own online grocery store Amazon Fresh to India, which will deliver fresh fruits and vegetables, dairy and meat items and other packaged food items to customers in two hours time. The move comes at a time when competition in the online food and grocery space is heating up with rival Walmart-backed Flipkart also eyeing a space in the market.
The global e-commerce giant continues to invest to further improve its Indian business, this time with the launch of another shipping portal under Prime Now, Amazon Fresh. Notably, Amazon Fresh was introduced in Seattle, in 2007, becoming the flagship food and grocery supply globally.
In India, Amazon had chosen to reserve Fresh’s launch and instead began express delivery of food products through its Bengaluru and a few other cities via app Prime Now. Amazon Fresh shop will allow daily essentials to be delivered in two hours to selected pin codes in Bengaluru. Today (August 23) the service will be introduced in Bengaluru, with roll-out also planned for other cities.
Customers can choose from 5,000 fruits and vegetables, milk, meat, ice creams and dry goods such as staples, packaged food, personal care and home care, the business said. The firm will also allow hyperlocal deliveries from shops around clients in the coming days, in addition to curating its own range.
The service is available exclusively for the Prime members with fastest 2-hour delivery slots for mere INR 49. All the customers will get the convenient 2-hour delivery slots starting from 6 AM to midnight with free delivery for orders above INR 600. Orders below INR 600 will be charged a delivery fee of INR 29.
Customers can experience the comfort and pace of ordering essential daily on Amazon.in with Amazon Fresh. Customers can now order and purchase the freshest fruits and vegetables as well as daily grocery within 2 hours. We are starting this service in Bengaluru and will roll it out to customers in other cities in the near future,” said Siddharth Nambiar, Director of Category Management at Amazon India.
This service is an extension of Amazon’s Prime Now service, which was earlier enabled only via a separate app. However, the Prime Now app will continue to serve customers in Delhi/NCR, Mumbai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad.
Amazon has been continuously diverting investments towards its food retail services, after facing several FDI restrictions in recent times. It is to be noted that Amazon grocery services had been a major plan for Amazon’s food retail plans for India, for which it has committed more than $500 Mn, of its $5 Bn commitment to its market in India.
As of April 2018, Amazon India had a total of 67 fulfillment centers across 13 Indian states. In addition to this, the company’s processing units are said to be spread across 19 Indian states and employs thousands of people, a testimony to the company’s vast delivery network across India.
In Grocery space, Amazon Fresh will now be competing against Alibaba-backed BigBasket, SoftBank-backed Grofers, among other players.
