New Delhi: E-commerce major Snapdeal said Wednesday it has added eight logistics centres to its network across manufacturing hubs. Among the Snapdeal centres added are Mathura, Noida and Mumbai. The E-commerce major has expanded keeping in mind the upcoming festive season.
The expansion is part of a decentralised network designed by Snapdeal. In the process its centres are located within commercial hubs inside a city to ensure faster pickup of packets from the sellers. “This has become all the more important due to COVID-19 related restrictions. The restrictions at times reduce the operating hours or prohibit weekend operations in some parts of India,” the E-commerce major said in a statement.
“The new centres are located inside the manufacturing hubs at Bahadurgarh, Yamuna Nagar (Haryana), Rajkot (Gujarat), Bhiwandi (Maharashtra), Agra, Noida, Mathura (Uttar Pradesh) and Mumbai,” it added.
Snapdeal said the new centres are part of a pre-Diwali increase in capacity to cater to the festive spike in volumes. The company did not disclose details around investment made towards the expansion.
“These new centres will cater to manufacturers and sellers of decor and furnishing items. Among the items are lights, curtains, bedsheets, kitchenware and apparel, including sarees and ethnic wear. All these items are expected to witness high festive sales volumes. This will happen due to an increase in the number of Indians preferring to buy online for convenience and safety reasons,” the statement said.
Earlier this year, Snapdeal had opened 15 logistics centres. With the new addition, the company now runs 23 logistics centres.
Snapdeal’s logistics hubs offer dedicated facilities for the manufacturing units, including packaging and online tracking for orders in transit. The hubs also facilitate faster movement of packets.
The new centres will cater to the growing shipment volumes from manufacturers who are opting to sell directly on Snapdeal, the company said. It added that there has been a steady increase in sellers on Snapdeal who manufacture their own products.
Snapdeal has stated that it aims to add 5,000 manufacturer-sellers on its platform this year. Most of these manufacturers produce and sell daily use products like steel and copper utensils. They also sell kitchen gadgets such as food processors, and fashion accessories.
The online marketplace has more than 5 lakh registered sellers with over 220 million million product listings.