Prime time TV & OTT now have competition from online shopping – Indians shop the most after 8 pm, says Meesho

• Online shopping is India’s new pastime during the prime time slot of 8 pm on weekdays.
  
• Indians are taking their fitness very seriously with sales of fitness equipment surging 3X in 2022 on online commerce platform Meesho.
  
• Customers from Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Ladakh and the north-eastern states are addicted to shopping as ordering from these states outpaces others.
  

There’s a new prime time slot, when Indians drop everything to do what they like doing most – shopping. It is not Saas Bahu drama that Indians are spending their time on these days after 8 pm. Shopping is the new competition that even OTT needs to watch out for. Meesho, the homegrown digital commerce platform, in its year-end report says that Indians shop the most on Sundays and after 8 pm on weekdays.

The pandemic may be on its way out, but the after-effects are lingering as habits have been formed in these three years. Indians are continuing to spend as much time or even more on shopping apps, if the scale of order volumes is anything to go by. And even though the pandemic may be on its last legs, Indians continue to remain health conscious, with 10,000 steps becoming the new normal. Meesho says in its year-end report that the fitness frenzy is real. From dumbbells to treadmills, sales of fitness equipment surged 3X in 2022 as orders poured in from Srinagar and Mathura to Guntur and Siliguri. For metro dwellers, it is yoga over everything else, with Bengaluru, Delhi, Chennai, Hyderabad and Mumbai buying the most yoga mats.

Meesho, which sought to democratise internet commerce for everyone, has done much to bridge the gap between Bharat and India. While its primary proposition is value for money, customers from across the length and breadth of India flocked to the portal in 2022 to search not just for low prices but also a variety of products. Meesho’s order volumes equalled the country’s total electorate: From Mumbai to Mirzapur, a record 91 crore orders were placed in 2022 (up 135% YoY), equalling India’s registered voter base in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls. At roughly 140 million, Meesho’s annual transacting users exceeded the combined population of the top three nations in FIFA World Cup 2022: France, Argentina and Croatia.

The most prolific shoppers are not from the metros. Customers from Andaman & Nicobar Islands are the most prolific with the highest number of orders per shopper. Ladakh comes close on the heels of the Andamans and the north-eastern states of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura and Sikkim come after.

Utkrishta Kumar, CXO, Business at Meesho, said, “2022 has been a breakout year for Meesho with the business growing exponentially. Our orders grew 135% YoY with growing demand not just from Tier 2+ regions but even value-seeking consumers from metros and Tier 1 who are increasingly shopping with us. This is a validation of our efforts to cater to customer needs for quality products at the lowest prices that were traditionally underserved by e-commerces.”

What did India buy online in 2022?

For years, grooming products found no takers as Indians were stuck at home during lockdowns. But men are now taking their grooming very seriously along with their fitness goals. ‘Smartwatch’ was the second-most searched product in 2022, showing how Indians are moving the needle on physical activity. And grooming products are not far behind as men from Tier 2 towns took better care of themselves, with more than 60% of orders coming from Tier 4 markets.

Surprisingly enough, the biggest orders did not come from metro cities but from a small town in Uttar Pradesh. The platform says that a customer from Uttar Pradesh placed an order every waking hour, totaling up to 6,384 orders in 2022.

The most cricket-crazy state is Uttar Pradesh, according to Meesho. Consumers from the state bought the maximum cricket gear. The country’s largest state was followed by Maharashtra, Bihar, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

Thanks to Akshay Kumar’s Padman, feminine hygiene has seen an uptick in Bharat. Orders for sanitary napkins grew 9X in Tier 2+ cities, demonstrating how e-commerce is creating accessibility for millions of women in Bharat.

Sarees continue to be a particular favourite fashion item for women. With 148 sarees sold per minute and demand coming in from all corners of the country, India’s love for the attire has only grown. Close on the heels of sarees, 93,000 t-shirts, 51,725 bluetooth earphones and 21,662 lipsticks were sold every day. Haryana stocked up on bed sheets, Jharkhand snapped up extension boards, Rajasthan took a special liking to bluetooth earphones while Assam bought body lotions like nobody’s business.

And even though reading may be fast going out of fashion, 8 in 10 orders for books came from Tier 2+ markets, with shoppers showing a clear inclination for self-help bestsellers like Ikigai, Atomic Habits, The Psychology of Money and Rich Dad Poor Dad.

Meesho has not just democratised online commerce by taking it to nooks and crannies of India, but has also enriched sellers in the process as it does not charge commissions. Sellers saved ₹3,700 crore in commissions in 2022, thanks to its zero-commission model. Meesho also onboarded 500,000 suppliers in 2022, with 61% of them new to e-commerce and selling online for the first time.