Shopsy – Journey of Flipkart’s Profitable Reselling App
In recent years India has experienced a boom in the internet and smartphone connectivity. Around 830 million internet connections were raised in the year 2021. This has helped India’s sector and is expected to reach US$1 trillion by 2030.
This has transformed the way India’s e-commerce sector operates. This change gave rise to various segments of commerce ranging from business-to-business B2B, direct-to-consumer D2C, consumers-to-consumers C2C, and consumer-to-business C2B. India’s D2c market is likely to reach US$ 60 billion by FY27.
The Indian e-commerce business has reached heights and more interestingly the top 10 e-commerce sites are the representation of the Indian brands.
Although the Indian e-commerce business is still in its early development stages. It has a market with huge opportunities with so many players in the market all the brands are working on developing their brands the best.
Shopsy Company Highlights
| Launch Year | 2021 |
| Founder | Launched by Walmart (Owned by Flipkart) |
| Headquarters | Bengaluru, Karnataka, India |
| Business Model | No commission for sellers, focuses on small vendors' growth, offers products at lower prices. |
| Tagline | "Shopsy pe prices aise lage free jaise" (Prices on Shopsy feel almost free) |
| Head of Shopsy | Kapil Thirani |
Growth of E-commerce
Nowadays, it has become so easy to start up an e-brand that a lot of people have started to open up their businesses from the comfort of their homes. The business is generating billions of dollars in monthly sales across the globe.
Since the pandemic, people's dependency on these e-commerce brands has risen to new heights. This gave rise to a lot of companies. People could order and sell anything they wanted to through these e-commerce brands.
It is very economical to start an online reselling service. The online reselling brand has helped the business to dodge production, handling, inventory, personnel, and instruments. The reseller merely acted as an agent between the actual producer and the consumer.
One such re-selling platform is Shopsy. Shopsy is an Indian B2C e-commerce platform launched by Walmart which is now owned by Indian e-commerce brand Flipkart.
About Shopsy
Shopsy was introduced by Flipkart in the year 2021 as a mobile app that allowed people in India to become a reseller. One of the unique advantages of being a reseller in Shopsy is 0% commission and low shopping costs proved to be very valuable in boosting the profits of the seller.
As of December, the app has 11 lakh sellers with almost 68% of customers coming from Tier 2 Indian cities. Flipkart claimed that Shopsy accounted for 40% of its new customers.
Shopsy started as a social commerce platform where resellers from different cities mainly smaller cities could order and earn commission, similar to the model of Meesho. But two years in Shopsy still focuses on driving direct purchases from consumers to grow the platform. The platform now wants to reach an estimated 300 million plus customers who are starting up from e-commerce.
The e-commerce has centers in Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Coimbatore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai, Patna and Pune which will be leveraged by Shopsy for their operations
Shopsy—Name, Logo, and Tagline
Shopsy Business Model
The main differentiation factor between Shopsy and Flipkart is the model of business. Shopsy charges no commission from its sellers whereas it's not true for Flipkart. The app focuses on small vendors and focuses on their growth.
The small vendors never have to register any trademark. The app provides the service to use smartphones to click photos of the products and post them as a reference to the product they’re selling. The app is very much oriented to the development of these small vendors.
The products sold on Shopsy are relatively cheaper than any other platform. The main reason is due to its strong connections with its suppliers and manufacturers, which enabled them to sell their product at wholesale rates.
Its tagline itself represents the motive:
“Shopsy pe prices aise lage free jaise”
This is very true as the rate at which Shopsy provides no other E-commerce platform can do so.
SHOPSY- Founder and Team
Shopsy is the subsidiary of one of the well-known e-commerce brands in India Flipkart. The main motive behind Shopsy was to create a market that promotes affiliate marketing. Shopsy even provides items listed on Flipkart at a lower price and an extra discount as a commission.
Although Flipkart introduced Shopsy in July 2021, it was launched by Walmart.
Shopsy headquarters is in Bengaluru, Karnataka India.
Kapil Thirani
Kapil Thirani is the head of Shopsy. He believes that he is leading a team of very hardworking as well as smart individuals. He says he and his team are creating The hyper value commerce platform for Bharat.
Start-Up story of Shopsy
On July 21, the Shops app was made available by Flipkart. The users are allowed to share catalogs of a large selection of 15 crores of products offered by Flipkart sellers, giving them the power to influence their local network and admire the ambitions of the sellers.
The Shopsy app enables individuals to become social media resellers of various goods. They’ll send commission by sending catalogs to customers on various social media platforms and messaging services.
According to Flipkart, Groceries on Shopsy will be available in 700 cities and 5,800 pin codes. It matches the variety provided by Flipkart.
Mission And Vision
Shopsy recently announced to launch of its 0% commission marketplace. It aims to bring small sellers in the market of fashion, grocery, and home industry online through Shopsy.
This initiation will boost e-commerce growth in tier-two cities and towns where it has never experienced the benefits of online marketing.
Prakash Sikaria the senior vice president shares his vision about Shopsy. He says that his vision for Shops is to enable digital commerce for everyone across India.
Investors and Funding
Shopsy is growing 100% week on week. The Flipkart group has committed to constantly expanding the scope of e-commerce.
Shopsy, the social commerce subsidiary of Flipkart has recorded 40x growth since its launch. The platform has around 2.5 lakh resellers, 51 lakh users, and a catalog of over 150 million products.
Due to its mission and vision of promoting affiliate marketing, it has seen an overwhelming number of users coming from tier 2 cities and towns
Advertisement and campaigns
Shopsy has launched its campaign with Sara Ali Khan as its brand ambassador. The campaign is done to highlight to the public the products and cheap prices that the app provides.
The company said it wants to destroy the myth that online shopping can break the myth of how expensive the online market can get. The app provides groceries as well as fashion stuff and deals in those products that no other brand ever did.
Competitors
Since Shopsy deals in an e-commerce market. The marketplace will be dealing with likes of Meesho Business Model which deals exactly in similar platforms by the name of Meesho Mandi. The platform was inaugurated last year.
It also faces competition from Deal Share which also deals in the exact same market segment.
Future Plans
Shops aims to have 100 million users by 2023 end. The app claims to have over 2.5 lakh sellers registered and has 150 million products ranging across fashion, grocery, and mobile, among others.
The company has been growing at a very fast pace over the last six months. It has also recorded a 2.7x increase in the units sold. Early 70% of Shopsy customers come from Tier 2 cities.