In a recent interview with Reuters, Amazon India’s head, Amit Agarwal, revealed that the company plans to invest heavily in the grocery business in the country. Agarwal stated that while the groceries and goods such as creams, soaps and cleaning products, were already the largest product category on Amazon, the company further plans to expand the business in the long run.
AmazonFresh is the company’s flagship fresh grocery delivery service which launched in the US market over a decade ago. The company hasn’t launched the service in India yet, but currently offers a few grocery items via a service named Pantry. Amazon has also tied up with local vendors in four cities for its Amazon Now service, which promises two-hour deliveries.
Agarwal further added:
“I would not speculate on when we would launch AmazonFresh but, absolutely, if you ask me the next five years of vision – from your avocados to your potatoes, and your meat to your ice cream – we’ll deliver everything to you in two hours…Probably in the next five years groceries and consumables would be more than half of our business”.
Amazon has already started experimenting with a few fresh grocery products in India, according to Agarwal. The Indian market is home to Amazon’s largest active customer base outside of the US and since India’s e-commerce market is tipped to grow to $200 billion in a decade, the company is looking to cash-in on the opportunity by increasing its product offerings.
