11 Top E-Commerce Startups

As the internet and the smartphones are being used casually and almost everyone has them, people are getting more and more technology friendly as well as are giving a way to technology to solve their daily tasks, even shopping. 

Normally, being in the market to choose from plethora of options for each of our needs like fashion, makeup and even grocery can be a tiring tasks but when all of these businesses make their online presence it not just minimizes the physical contact to be able to shop between the consumer and the seller but it also serves another benefits which are availability of a wide variety of brands and options for the same product, cheaper prices and the comfort of shopping by being in our homes. 

This advantage is provided to us by the means of the internet and the presence of e-commerce businesses and startups by people who took this as an opportunity to make people aware how easy and convenient online shopping for goods and services can be.

 

 

What is E-Commerce? 

E commerce refers to electronic commerce or internet commerce. Which describes buying and selling of goods or services using the internet and to transfer the money via various online portals to these businesses to complete the transaction process. It is both, the sale of physical products online as well as any transaction made online with a pre determined purpose of the same.  

E  commerce is being famously taken advantage of as people are getting lured by the convenience it brings to their dynamic and hassled lifestyle. Via these platforms people can buy anything anytime and with the option to be able to choose from the considerable number of options available to them on the internet. 

 

As businesses are increasing, establishing everyday and some old and traditional ones are also making their online presence it is getting turned into a wide virtual space to shop various items. 

 

The advantages of e commerce are: 

 

1. You can shop from the comfort of your home or workplace and have the product reach you without any physical presence or effort made.

2. You get to save time as well as money which would hence be used in commuting to the market.

 

3. As there are online businesses which focus on eradicating any business intermediaries they are able to offer the customers more discounted rates and also claimable guaranteed offers as a reward to their loyalty. 

A lot of businesses are understanding the consumer needs are working to make them have the advantage of online shopping in various categories. Let’s have a look at top startups taking the Indian Market of e commerce by storm and marking their presence in the cellphones of almost every other user. 

 

Top Ecommerce Startups

1. Flipkart 

Flipkart is an Indian e commerce company, it was started in October 2007 by two IIT Delhi alumnus Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, who worked in amazon before coming up with the idea of their own. This Bangalore based company initially began as an online book sales company and afterwards it expanded their domain. 

 

Currently, it deals in various distinct categories such as consumer electronics, fashion, home essentials, groceries and lifestyle products. 

Flipkart deals in various products and has an annual event in the form of  a sale to promote the sales by huge discounts under the name ‘Big Billion Days’. 

Also it was in 2016 that the company came up with their home brand called ‘Flipkart Smartbuy’ where it collaborated with various manufacturers to provide quality assured products in various kinds like electronic chargers, data cables, power banks, home decors, tiffin boxes, jars etc. 

In 2018 when Walmart officially announced it has acquired a 77% controlling stake in Flipkart for $16 billion.

2. Nykaa 

The brand name Nykaa is derived from the Sanskrit word nayaka, meaning ‘one in the spotlight’. is a popular name in the e-commerce and retail domain currently. It deals with more than 400 brands to provide with a a comprehensive range of cosmetics, skincare, haircare, fragrances, bath and body, luxury and wellness products for women and men, both. It was founded in 2012 by Falguni Naiyyar.

Nykaa mainly operates with it’s online website and application with warehouses in Mumbai, Delhi and Bangalore and it operates it’s offline store in two categories mainly Nykaa on Trend and Nykaa Luxe, featuring both Indian and International beauty products. 

Within 3 years of it’s launch in 2015 Nykaa found a niche to launch it’s in house brand under the name Nykaa (private label) to provide beauty and bath care products range to the customers. Nykaa’s private label currently manufactures more than 50 products like sheet masks, nail enamels, soaps etc. 

3. Zivame 

As lingerie shopping has been a taboo in India and various women feel uncomfortable in being able to be clear and shop for these essentials from the shop. It was with the consideration of this idea that Richa Karr, an MBA student developed this online lingerie shopping platform in 2011 called Zivame. The name Zivame comes from a Hebrew word radiance.  

Her idea of lingerie shopping was initially opposed by her parents who were really reluctant about the concept due to its stereotypical approach. Yet this did not stop this entrepreneur from fulfilling her goals of providing Indian women with an embarrassment free option to do lingerie shopping.
 

Zivame currently has 200+ employees with a million visitors on their online stores everyday. This business has a worth of more than Rs. 681 Crores. 

4. Lenskart

Lenskart is a leading and a renowned name in the Indian market for eyewear dealing with eyeglasses, contact lenses and sunglasses. This company was founded in 2010 by Peyush Bansal with Sumeet Kapahi and Amit Chaudhary. 

Lenskart currently deals with 5,000 styles of frames and 45 different types of superior quality lenses to its customers following an inventory based model.
They also use germany imported technologies in their manufacturing to make eyewear accurate upto 3 decimal points. 

Also lenskart implies its wide range of products testable by providing a 3D trial feature on the shopping application for its users, where they can try the real image based on the spectacles before ordering it online. Lenskart currently operates both online and offline and it also has a membership program and with that it holds out several member only discounted rates for the customers. 

Lenskart in its true sense realized what the Indian markets were lacking and provided it with utmost perfection and opportunity.
 

5. Big Basket 

Gone are the days when one had to wait in huge queues and go to a crowded place and bargain to get the maximum discounts on veggie and grocery shoppings. 

Big Basket is an online Indian e commerce grocery delivering service. This Bangalore based company was founded in December 2011. The company primarily delivers grocery goods found in convenience stores, home essentials and food supplies to its customers directly to their homes. 
 

This was founded by Sudhakar, Hari Menon, Vipul Parekh, Abhinay Choudhari and Ramesh. As the business grew the company acquired A micro delivery firm called DailyNinja and in February 2021 Tata Group acquired a 68% stake in Big Basket. 

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Top Ecommerce Startups

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6. SnapDeal 

 

This New Delhi based company, Snapdeal was founded in 2010 by Kunal Bahl and Rohit Bansal. This company was initially founded as a daily deals platform, which extended in September 2011 to become an online marketplace where it dealt with multiple categories of products. 

There are 5Lakhs + sellers in the snapdeal model dealing with various products ar the street or local price. It evaluated the market needs and the kinds of products it sought online to provide with the customers to all the products ranging from electronics to fashion to essentials wtc. 

However there happened to be a failed merger of Snapdeal and Flipkart which happened due to Snapdeal board not agreeing to the made proposal. This was an incident which not only secured the market share of Snapdeal as it was prevalent but it also led Snapdeal to evolve into Snapdeal 2.0 This new model fetched them a lot of significant results as it was based on understanding of the everyday evolving market of india.

 

7. Purplle 

Purplle is a beauty online e-commerce store facing tough competition form its parallel beauty store Nykaa. However what makes this 2012 founded startup different and unique is the fact that it primarily focuses on personalization of the products based on the skin and hair type of the customer seeking to purchase the products. 
 

Manish Taneja, Rahul Das, Suyash Katyayani, all of them IITians chose to go with the line of cosmetics as the urban women were getting more and more exposure and inclination towards cosmetic products. As a part of this understanding of the market Purplle currently makes more than Rs 15 Crores per month by its e-commerce platform solely. 
 

This company has not just paved the way for international beauty products in Indian markets like Moda Cosmetics and Vipera Cosmetics but also has launched a Private label of skincare and beauty to expand its reach more deeply in the market. 

 

8. Clovia 

Clovia is one of the fastest growing lingerie brands in the Indian Market in terms of brand designs and choices available for the products. This 2013 established brand is both the manufacturer and the marketer of the products under the same name. This was founded by Pankaj Vermani, Neha Kant and Suman Chawdhry. 

 

These people realized that the women in India have been given fewer choices regarding these products and the minimal choices available were put on very high prices and here they saw an opportunity to come up with a new and economical brand for the women lingerie. This company currently also deals with online and offline shops both to be able to better connect to their customers.
 

9. Coolwinks 

Coolwinks is an ecommerce startup for eyewear featuring sunglasses contact lenses and eyeglasses. This 2016 founded company has its roots in Gurgaon and is founded by Ganesh Iyyer. 

 

Iyyer realised that poor vision is an issue which is being faced by a lot of people in the country and also realised that there is little or no address to these issues and he came up with a solution in the form of Coolwinks as he wished for a company that would ensure to provide people with eyewear products that are stylish, affordable, and of high quality. 

This company mainly focused on advertising and retargeting of the products mainly using Facebook Pixel features available for the purpose. This company due to its wide reach in the Indian market is facing a huge competition from another eyewear brand called lenskart.
 

10. Licious 

Licious is a meat and seafood e commerce business setup in Bangalore owning the entire back-end supply chain and cold chain. This 2015 founded company sells ready to cook meat and meals specializing in frozen meat which they get delivered to the doorsteps of the consumers. 

 

The founders of the company Abhay Hanjura and Vivek Gupta are firm believers of the meat consuming indian community and wanted to make it convenient for the people so they came up with this idea. 

Currently with a consumer base exceeding 3 lakhs and  this startup is growing at a rate of 300% since its advent in the market where it not only found its place but at the same time it organized the meat consuming consumers.

 

11. FirstCry 

 

FirstCry  is yet another e commerce startup taking the market by the storm because of the unique concept of making baby products of more than 1000 brands available online in various categories ranging from diapers, clothes, accessories, toys etc. 

This Pune based startup was founded in 2010 by Supam Maheshwari and Amitava Saha. This organized the promising babycare sector in India so much that it recently valued at $1.2 billion and is one of the recent additions to India’s unicorn startup club.   This currently has lakhs of visitors on its application everyday alongside 400+ offline stores across the country.

Recommended Blog: What is a Unicorn Startup?

 

Conclusion

As the technology has evolved people find it really convenient to have everything they want delivered at the doorsteps. E commerce is a platform that provides various businesses to grab and maximize the opportunities available with this field. There are various businesses dealing with products ranging from daily essentials to fashion to electronics to eyewear understanding the concept and scenario of the indian markets and getting loyal customers benefiting them and serving them with utmost ease.