If Amazon, Flipkart or Reliance tie up with kiranas, the last-mile fulfilment is easy. They can pipe in products into these kiranas With the friendly neighbourhood kirana stores stepping up efforts to service their customers during the lockdown, Prasun Basu, president (South Asia Zone) at research and information firm Nielsen Global Connect, speaks of their performance vis-a-vis modern trade and e-commerce channels and why big retailers such as Amazon, Flipkart and even Reliance Retail are betting on them.
Edited excerpts from an interview: There’s a perception that kiranas have outperformed other channels during the lockdown. It is difficult to call out that the kiranas did better.