What was your mission behind starting the Digital Hippo Stores?
We launched our digital platform to reach out to a larger audience to help them have a seamless experience just like we offer in the store.
With the vision of being a part of every Indian home’s construction and renovation, we launched our digital platform in February 2022 for B2C customers aka homeowners. The platform displays 30,000+ products online from 160+ brands, all at wholesale prices, enhancing the buying process of homeowners and enabling them to browse through a number of items at any time and order seamlessly from anywhere.
What makes the online platform unique is its proposition to let the customers compare prices of a wide selection of building products from assorted brands, across various categories.
What are the USPs of the store?
Our Unique Selling Points are what keep us ahead of the competition. Our primary USPs are – We offer Genuine Original Products from trusted brands.
Product Knowledge – We believe in educating the customers with enough knowledge and information about the products. We make product comparisons easy for our customers. Through our digital platform, customers can compare and choose from more than 30000 building products across 160 brands. All the building products available online and at our physical store are available at wholesale prices.
The challenges & opportunities for the Omni-channel initiative of the company
Challenges - We all know that the backbone of retail is a strong supply chain. But the complexity of the supply chain is one of the highest in the construction industry. And lack of visibility in the supply chain results in higher risk.
The supply chain for various construction and building materials is fragmented and unorganized in this sector. This entire process from creating an innovative technology-driven retailing, to the online process of construction material procurement was challenging, taking into account the existing complexity of the supply chain.
Establishing the best material delivery process is highly challenging. In spite of that, managing material delivery at a specific time and at the lowest cost is what we aim at.
Opportunities - With the launch of our Ecommerce portal, we are offering our customers the ease of shopping anytime and from anywhere. After the opening of our mega store in Mayapuri, the launch of our e-commerce platform for Homeowners was an evident step towards progression. Some of the opportunities we would like to highlight –
The concept was to move away from the traditional way of retailing and offer our customers with something new and technology-friendly. The building and construction retailing sphere is an organized sector. Hippo Stores bridges the gap between the market and the consumer by bringing together all building products under one roof. Be it is our physical store or online platform, Hippo Stores helps them to buy all building materials, by being the one-stop shop for all construction materials.
Hippo Stores aims at making the entire process of home construction and renovation a hassle-free process for the consumer. This market is highly unorganized and adding on to it is the lack of price transparency in building products. Therefore, we offer clear and transparent pricing and specifications for each product. We are the one-stop destination for all building materials offering genuine products, all at wholesale pricing.
In order to save time and make the process convenient, we let our customers make their own decisions by comparing and choosing products and pricing across all categories. A multi-channel or omnichannel approach is one of the good ways to interact with the customers. With multiple formats – physical store and digital platform – Hippo Stores aims at increasing the in-store footfall as well as getting more traffic online which may convert into sales. Lastly, our promise of offering genuine and original products from trusted brands makes us connect with our customers instantly.
How do you see the future growth of the home construction and renovation segment in the next few years?
Due to the increased demand for real estate and housing projects, the construction industry in India will continue to grow. Home renovation currently is being driven by a lot of requirements arising from work-at-home. The necessities of a modern professional have evolved now to include a working space within the confines of the home, and this, along with the higher time spent at home in general, has led to a lot of focus on home improvement and renovation.
For middle-income families, owning a home has always been a goal, which is why new home construction isn't slowing down. In fact, the period of the first lockdown witnessed a shutdown of many construction sites and resulted in a disruption in the economy. But construction and building materials have seen a revival and upsurge in the post-pandemic recovery of economy. In the Residential Realty Consumer Sentiment Outlook (January-June 2022) report, Naredco (National Real Estate Development Council) highlighted that 47 per cent of the consumers have a preference to invest in real estate, the highest compared to other asset classes like stocks, gold, and fixed deposit.
