Myntra joins the quick commerce race with 30-minute fashion delivery

New Delhi: As the fast delivery trend reshapes retail, fashion players like Flipkart-backed Myntra are jumping on the quick commerce bandwagon to meet rising consumer expectations.

“Over the last two years, there was one realization that customers were increasingly asking for faster delivery of fashion. That's because post-pandemic, there has been greater acceptance of online fashion," Nandita Sinha, CEO, Myntra, said in an interview with Mint.

After experiencing success with its quick delivery pilot service in November, Myntra is scaling its 30-minute delivery in Bengaluru. In the coming months, it plans to expand the offering to Delhi, Mumbai, and Pune, joining more companies that are trying to compete with quick commerce platforms. 

The 30-minute delivery service under M-Now is applicable across 10,000 styles across fashion, beauty, and accessories with the company planning to scale it to over 1 lakh styles in the next three-four months. 

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The selection will include collections from brands such as Vero Moda, Mango, Tommy Hilfiger, Levi’s, Only, Jack&Jones, Metro shoes, Arrow, Louis Philippe, Pantaloons Juniors, Rare Rabbit, and Forever New apart from beauty brands such as Huda Beauty, MAC, Bobbi Brown, Forest Essentials, Carolina Herrera, Armani, Paco Rabanne, Myntra said.

To be sure, Myntra already offers 24-48 hour delivery via its M-Express service.

The retailer has 70 million monthly active users.

Modus operandi

Myntra is building micro-hubs and will also use existing offline stores of partner brands to fulfill such deliveries. “There are micro hubs that have been created to accommodate 10,000 styles. We are in the process of expanding to almost 1 lakh selections which are coming from the offline store network that we have always enabled. Whatever we are servicing today is via a set of micro-hubs that have been already set up," Sinha said.

About taking the service to Mumbai, Delhi, and Pune in the coming months, she said, "There is scope across different tiers of cities—I think we have to build the right selection." 

With quick commerce platforms altering consumer behaviour, more shoppers are now expecting 10-20 minute delivery timelines for staples and other eseentials.

In response, several e-commerce marketplaces such as beauty products platform Nykaa and e-commerce major Flipkart are already offering quick deliveries.

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Analysts, though, are skeptical about Myntra's 30-minute delivery service, arguing that the need for immediate clothing delivery is less pronounced than for groceries and essential items.

“All e-commerce companies are feeling the pressure of quick commerce and responding with lowering lead times," said Karan Taurani of Elara Securities.

“Apparel and fashion is the only category which has seen the least impact as far as quick commerce is concerned because these are planned purchases. The category also has a high reverse logistics cost with return rates as high as 30-40%. All e-commerce companies are feeling the pressure of quick commerce and responding with lowering lead times. This is a response to that," he said.

Taurani anticipates Myntra to start levying a convenience fee for the service going forward.

Myntra’s Sinha, however, said the online retailer is “not experimenting" with additional fees. “But the space will evolve," she said.

The service will also mean additional costs as the retailer scales up micro warehouses dedicated to quick deliveries. Sinha dubbed such costs as “long-term" investments.

“If you look at the opportunity that the fashion landscape provides to platforms, like ourselves, there is a lot of scope for us to grow as consumer needs go up and as the Gen Z population grows," she said.

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