On May 18, “Consumption slowdown will be uttermost” said Albinder Dhindsa, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Grofers.

Most of the companies are facing lots of problems in their sales and demands were collapsed. But online grocery stores are besieged by flood of numbers of new customers. Now the country faces the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, so 73% of the people choose to order online for their convenience and safety of home delivery instead of local shops and not because they are in cheaper price than stores. Once this COVID-19 pandemic passes, the monthly order volume of company will be raised by 30-35% levels, said by Albinder Dhindsa, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Grofers. And he warned that the consumption slowdown in under way and will only get worse.

During the first phase of lockdown, everything was not normal because at that time the demand was higher but the supply were impacted due to the labour disruptions and warehouse closed. And day by day in lockdown, everything going back to normal except some cities like Mumbai, Pune and Ahmedabad in which the COVID-19 at their higher peak and the things are worse for the people.

Now the people prefer to buy online and mostly the packed and branded items because the people start taking their health first and these things are more hygienic stuff. And the contribution in the online grocery stores as, except the cities Mumbai, Pune and Ahmedabad which are counted in Red Zones because of the higher number of cases of COVID-19, so this interrupted the business by 30% before COVID-19. The rest of the cities contributed 70% and business has grown bigger.

Online grocery, today the volumes would be 30-35% higher but pre-COVID the number were doubled. If this kind of lockdown persists for some more time then the order volumes will be double than before COVID-19. Due to this dangerous disease, people are buying smaller packs and private labels, but which are cheaper in price and not even now, before COVID-19 also people are buying cheaper brands. But it seems to be getting worse. So it will be continue.