Record 1.4 bn visits during 'The Big Billion Days' festive sales: Flipkart

A record 1.4 billion customers visited Flipkart’s platform during its flagship festival sales event “The Big Billion Days' (TBBD) 2023”.

The event, which started on October 8 (with early access for VIP and Plus customers from October 7) and ended on October 15, “received a great response from both customers and extensive network of sellers across the country”, said Kalyan Krishnamurthy, chief executive officer of Flipkart Group.

Choices in smartphones, laptops, tablets, and home appliances indicated a strong premiumisation trend across India this year. Televisions, audio devices, smartphones, and grooming products were also among the leading choices.

According to Flipkart executives, deliveries were made to remote places, such as Andaman, Hayuliang (Arunachal Pradesh), Choglamsar (Ladakh), Kutch (Gujarat), and Longewala (Rajasthan).

Flipkart's kirana partners delivered over 4 million packages in the first four days of TBBD 2023.

Flipkart said seller success reached new heights on India's homegrown e-commerce marketplace with 2x crorepati seller growth over TBBD 2022. The firm's Samarth programme created an 'Indian Roots Store Front', which enabled a large community of weavers and artisans to bring over 350,000 products across home, furnishing, and lifestyle categories. Samarth sellers observed 6x growth compared to the pre-festival period.

A range of affordability options made products and services more accessible for millions of shoppers during TBBD 2023. With offers on instant savings and unlimited cashback, Flipkart Axis Bank Credit Card witnessed an 8X growth in overall spends and 4X growth in orders placed, when compared to the pre-festive period. While Flipkart Pay Later grew by 4X, EMI spends increased by 7X compared to the pre-festive period.

New on-app experiences such as Flippi (a Chat GPT-powered shopping assistant), Vibes (video-led browsing experience) and SPOYL (Gen Z Fashion experience) saw big traction, with a 4X increase in engagement compared to the pre-festive period.

Flipverse (3D-rendered, immersive Virtual World with multiple brand spaces) saw a 10X increase in visits compared to the pre-festive period.

With a majority of viewers from Tier-II+ regions, Flipkart's Video Commerce offering witnessed the highest viewership to date. This includes the total watch time of 8 lakh hours by over 50 million users at a scale of 16X transactions compared to pre-TBBD.

There was a 60 per cent increase observed in Flipkart Plus memberships, compared to TBBD 2022. Trends observed on Cleartrip indicate that this festive season, Indians made air bookings to Dubai, Bangkok, Singapore, Colombo and Phuket internationally. Goa, Kochi and Jaipur were top domestic choices. Medicines on Flipkart witnessed a 2.5X increase in shoppers, with over 62 per cent of customers coming from Tier-II cities and beyond, with multivitamins and Ayush products being popular choices.

Amazon India's Great Indian Festival (GIF), which also began on the same day with access for Prime members beginning a day earlier, generated a record 95 million customer visits in 48 hours. However, the GIF is a month-long event. Amazon recently said shopping by its Prime members spiked 18 times in the first 24 hours (early access period) of the month-long GIF versus average daily purchase. "The first 48 hours has been absolutely remarkable," said Manish Tiwary, vice-president and country manager of India Consumer Business at Amazon. "We are elated to witness the biggest ever opening with record customer visits, and the highest number of Prime members shopping during the 24 hours of Prime Early Access."

E-commerce retailers are expected to garner sales worth Rs 90,000 crore this festival season, 18 to 20 per cent higher than last year, according to a report by Redseer Strategy Consultants. This shall be driven by about 140 million shoppers who are expected to be transacting online at least once during the festival month.