CASE STUDY ON FLIPKART

Flip kart went live in 2007 with the initial capital of Rs.4 lakhs. The objective was to make books

easily available to anyone who had internet access. Today, they include various categories such

as movies, music, games, mobile, cameras, computers, health care and personal products, home

appliances and electronics, stationery, perfumes, toys, apparels, shoes. Be it there path breaking

services like cash on delivery, a 30 day replacement policy, EMI options, free shipping and off

course the great prices that they offer, everything they do revolves around their obsession with

providing their customers a memorable online shopping experience.

Flip kart have a very dedicated delivery partners who work around the clock to personally make

sure the packages reach on time. So it’s no surprise that they are a favorite online shopping

destination. Initially, flipkart used a word of mouth marketing to popularize their company. A

fewer months later, the company sold its first book on flipkart.com-“John Woods Living

Microsoft to the World”. As per Alexa traffic ranking, flipkart is on a rank of 170 and as per

Google ranking its stand at 6th position among the top ten Indian websites and has been credited

with being India’s largest online book seller with over 170 million titles on offer.

The series of acquisitions includes:

• 2010- weREAD

• 2011- MIME360

• 2011- CHAKPAK.COM

• 2012- LETSBUY.COM

• 2014- MYNTRA.COM

The procurement model is at the heart of flipkarts success, as most delays or troubles occur in

this part of business. Flipkart employed procurement based on demand. It is the robust logistics

at flipkart that sets it apart from other e- commerce sites and amazingly well oiled warehousing

and delivery system.

The process of attracting a prospective customer to view the site and try to make sure people

purchases the goods is called the Order Lifecycle. Attracting users to site through family, friends,

search engine optimization, search engine marketing, word of mouth, brand building enables

selection to the consumer by making it easy to find and discover to the most obvious options.

Flipkart provide convenient payment options online, like credit card, net banking, debit card,

wire transfer, phone banking and cash on delivery. They confirm the payment. There is a

supplier selection team to get the goods in Just in Time and there is an inventory prediction,

planning, and quality checks. Pack the item with tamper proof, weather proof, breakage proof,

select courier and hand over the courier. Get tracking id and communicate to the customer.

Follow up for timely delivery. Take care of returns.

The best thing they did was that they understood that to be successful in India, you need to be the

god of distribution. In India, it’s amazing logistics that prove to be the gain changer and that’s

exactly what the folks at flipkart have done.

Flipkart launched “big billion day” sale on 6th October 2014 with exciting offers. Flipkart

indicated that it sold Rs. 600Crore worth of goods within 10 hours of starting its sale. But, on the

day things went awry and customers were left high and dry due to improper pricing, technical

glitches, slow response on website. Customers didn’t receive their order details despite paying

for product and 1 in 600 visitors managed to shop. Sachin Bansal and Binny Bansal, Flipkart’s

founders, wrote a letter to their customers personally apologizing for the difficulties they faced

during Monday’s sale.

Customers should also learn that all advertising discount may not be their piece of cake, they had

to save time by registering and using wallets, the deal on the offer may not be the best. They

should be aware about replacement or exchange policy and other promotions. It would be better

to use cash on delivery option.

The sale angered Samsung, Sony and other tech giants over ‘rock bottom prices’. Companies

have suspended fresh sales and it is facing government scrutiny, complaints from traders.

Enforcement Directorate is inquiring into whether the Company has flouted any retail rules

during its massive discount sale held. Flipkart did not specifically comment on the matter but

said the company was in “complete compliance with the laws of the land and will cooperate with

authorities when required”.

Q1. What are the success mantras of flipkart?

Q2. What went wrong on big billion day? According to you how flipkart should have managed

‘the Big Billion Day’.

Q3. What would be the position of flipkart in upcoming days compared to their past? How they

would overcome in future?