Walmart, Amazon are turning small Indian firms into global entrepreneurs

Indo Count Industries, a lesser known textiles manufacturer in India, is one of the fastest growing suppliers of home textiles in the US and Europea. The company has entered 49 foreign markets and aims to be a global leader.

For Mumbai-based Indo Count, global retail monolith Walmart offered the gateway. A partnership with Walmart’s home brand ‘Canopy’ over a decade ago helped the Indian textiles maker expand globally.

Being a Walmart supplier has elavated its position to a trusted supplier in the marketplace and has also allowed the company to invest smartly to increase its market share globally.

Indo Count Industries is not a case study in isolation. Hordes of home-grown Indian manufacturers and sellers are profiting incessantly from the business models and facilitation offered by India focused multinationals like Walmart and Amazon. Walmart with its sourcing model and Amazon by offering a ‘Global Selling Programme’, are raising the aspirational bar for small Indian businesses, elevating them to earn the coveted tag of ‘global entrepreneurs’.

Building on its global sourcing model, Walmart has set up a global sourcing centre in Bengaluru. The centre sources an array of India made products- textiles, apparel, pharmaceuticals and handicrafts for catering to 14 international markets.

“India is an important sourcing market for Walmart. Not only do we procure over 95 per cent of the goods sold in our Best Price stores from local companies, including SME (small & medium enterprises) and women entrepreneurs, but we also have a global sourcing centre located in Bangalore. We work closely with and engage our suppliers to understand and meet our responsible sourcing and compliance standards”, said Marilee McInnis, Director Corporate Affairs, Global Communication, Walmart.

Ashish Kapoor, director at Panipat-based Kapoor Industries, reminisces how a partnership with Walmart in 2006 fashioned the growth in the company. According to Kapoor, the company registered a growth of 33 per cent in 2016 and 50 per cent in 2017. Between 2015 and 2017, Kapoor Industries grew from manufacturing 1.2 million pieces per month (600 tonnes) in 2015 to 2.4 million pieces per month (1,200 tonnes) in 2017. “Our plan is growing the production assets by 33 per cent per year which will expand our business by 100 per cent in less than three years”, he says. As the leading producer cum exporter of bath, beach and kitchen towels, Kapoor Industries accomplished annual export (to US) turnover of $125 million in 2017.

If Walmart is spinning success stories of Indian manufacturers in global markets, Amazon is taking ‘Make in India’ to the world, bolstered by its ‘Global Selling Programme’.

Saroj, a global seller on Amazon from Ghaziabad (Uttar Pradesh) started selling copperware online with modest sales of Rs 2,000 per month. He then evaluated the customer feedback and reviews on the global marketplace and repositioned his products. The strategy helped Saroj considerably and his earnings rocketed from Rs 24,000 to Rs 2 crore per year.

Amazon said it is empowering sellers from small towns in India by scaling up their businesses and leveraging the digital economy.

“Today, we have over 50,000 Indian sellers as part of the Global Selling Program, 80 per cent of them are from Tier 2 and below cities. Sellers and manufacturers in India are producing great quality products and there is an opportunity to connect this supply to hundreds of millions of loyal customers on Amazon’s various marketplaces. The aim of Global Selling program is to encourage and empower more and more exporters to come online, reach out to a global customer base and grow and scale their business”, said Abhijit Kamra, Head- Global Selling, Amazon India.

Rohit Mehrotra, co-founder, California Design Den credits it to Amazon for launching and building his own brand in the US market. “After 10 years of manufacturing and exporting to US retailers, we wanted to launch our own brand in US market, but it was so competitive that our efforts did not yield good results. Then we got on Amazon platform through Amazon Global Selling program. The continuous guidance and support of the team made sure we understood the long game and focused on quality and giving value to customer. It has also been instrumental in helping us become one of the bestsellers in our category. Another milestone for us has been the participation in various sale events in the US like Black Friday, Cyber Monday and Christmas and last year itself we saw a growth of 200 per cent”, he said.

Through various spike sale events on global marketplaces like Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk, the e-commerce giant provides a lucrative platform for Indian sellers to engage with global customers. Whether it is Prime Day, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday or a specifically curated Diwali Bazaar, Indian sellers get good traction from customers abroad for their products. Amazon’s global selling team and third-party service providers are available to provide local enablement solutions to e-sellers – from tax specialists and logistics partners, to branding consultants to enable a smooth global transition.