Online Cosmetic Shopping – A Wise Concept of Spending Penny

Since ages it has been known that cosmetics are an imperative part of a woman's live. Strengthening to it a roman philosopher ‘Platus’ had also said that ‘a woman without paint is like food without salt’. One can also get the proof from the found sculptures and historical paintings where in women in different civilization had used different cosmetic product to enhance their beauty. Adding to their natural beauty, cosmetic products make a woman confident and ready to conquer the world.

Evolving from Egyptian kohl to French rogue, cosmetics have seen a dramatic transition in its outlook and significance. Not only the product but the cosmetic industry has also reached to new heights. Grown leaps and bounds all over the world, the segment has introduced numerous brands to meet the beauty needs of the women. From eye and lip colour palettes to shampoos, perfumes, correctors, concealers, blush and many more, these brands offer an endless list to the consumer. But the physical market faces a major problem of demographic barrier and expensive price value of the products.

To this problem internet and its family has given an advantageous solution in the form of Online Shopping. Emerged as an effective media of advertising, online shopping has helped women to explore and buy cosmetic of any brand easily and quickly. Presenting an extended range from renowned as well as emerging brands, online cosmetics shopping allows women to add safe, improved yet trendy products to their collection. In addition to this, online cosmetic shopping has added to the excitement of women by offering attractive deals and discounts even on their branded beauty products. A better alternative to traditional shopping in terms of saving time & energy, online shopping is attracting shoppers from all walks of life to buy cosmetic online.

Coping with the busy lifestyle of women, online cosmetic shopping allows them to search, compare, select and purchase the beauty products by sitting comfortably at home, office or any location. With just a few clicks, a woman can buy cosmetic of most famous brands like Loreal, Revlon, Maybelline, Lakme, Cover Girl, La Femme Beauty or any at very economical rate. Purchasing cosmetics online also provides other advantages like door step delivery, easy payment options, product evaluation, extended range, comfort and many more.

Acting as a cyber smart consumer, a woman can grab the best bargains on it desired beauty product while purchasing cosmetics online. It is advisable that one should do some homework and answer few questions before purchasing cosmetics online. One of the paramount aspect is to have the knowledge of the skin type, then a clear thought about the needs to ensure that the selected products is of use or not. It is also a good practise to read the reviews and recommendation of the users so that your skin gets benefited instead of suffering from the products. One also needs to look about the terms, conditions and policies of the retailer when planning to buy cosmetics online.

Simple and easy, online cosmetic shopping has not only helped women to look more stylish and attractive but to reveal their secret gestures by giving a wide gallery of cosmetic products.

Online Shopping a New Trend Easing the Life

Online shopping is now becoming a fashionable alternative to frequenting garage sales or browsing through physical stores. Rushing in their busy life, people are getting more inclined towards the internet and their technologies for solving the daily chaos. Using the Internet for shopping not only saves the consumer a great deal of money but also help the consumer to find their selected product more easily and quickly. Offering exciting and pleasing experiences, online shopping stores have eased the life of modern people around the globe by saving their precious time and energy.
Grooming day by day, online stores have created a gigantic virtual market offering thousands of products from both the high as well as low street merchandisers. Listing all possible products and services, these online shopping stores allow the shoppers to move across a wide gallery without leaving the comfort of their place. Additionally, this extended merchandiser listing also helps consumers to evaluate the product before shopping online so that they can grab best product that too at attractive deal.
Shrinking the global market under just a click, online shopping has given various other privileges to the consumers. Some of them can be counted as door step delivery, easy payment options, convenience and efficiency. One of the advantageous characteristic of shopping online is the removal of demographic barrier. Shoppers from any geographic location can shop online for a wide range of products like jewellery, home appliances, baby products, health equipments, computer, mobile or other electrical appliances and the list goes on. One can also shop online for gifts and send them to their family and friends living abroad or other location.
Gaining a momentum, online shopping India has also reached to new heights and allowed consumers to buy any product. Serving the consumer round the clock, online shopping India stores have established their position by selling premium products at most competitive prices, delivering on time at customer's doorsteps. Further, to provide best consumer services these online shopping stores follow ethical practices and adopt fair policies that gives pleasing shopping experiences to domestic as well as international consumers.

Only one e-grocery start-up has attracted funding so far

More than half a dozen start-ups have launched online grocery stores in recent months. Working people, happy to have rice, sugar and even organic pepper delivered to their doorstep, may wonder why no one thought of it sooner. But egroceries are a tricky business. The success of online book and gadget retailers is little reason to assume that this sudden smorgasbord will fare well.

There is, of course, room for growth. According to consultancy firm Technopak Advisors, food and groceries account for $343 billion (Rs 15.44 trillion; one trillion equals 100,000 crore), or 68 per cent, of the $505-billion Indian retail market. Within this category, the organised food and grocery market, estimated at $12 billion, is expected to grow at a compound annual rate of 30 per cent in the next five years.

That might explain why 26-year-old Ambuj Jhunjhunwala, who started online supermarket MyGrahak in 2010, wears a confident smile. The entrepreneur, whose family promotes 6Ten, a 300-store retail chain, is unfazed that he has three rivals in the National Capital Region alone (see Grocers Galore, page 72). "The market has room for everyone," says Ajay Mittal, Director, Ascent Capital. His company recently invested $10 million in BigBasket, the only egrocery venture to attract funding.

"If people can buy highly touch-andfeel products like shoes or apparel online, why not grocery," asks Vaibhav Goel, founder of three-month-old FamilyKart, which delivers around 20 orders a day in and around Delhi. E-grocers enjoy some advantages over regular supermarkets. They save on costs such as rent, store staff, and managing store inventory in addition to warehouse inventory. Two years ago, 6Ten closed 25 stores that were not doing well. More recently, Future Group's Big Bazaar and the More chain, operated by Aditya Birla Retail, also shut several stores that had turned unviable. "Delivery costs account for 60 per cent of what we would incur on rentals, so we save 40 per cent," says Hari Menon, co-founder of Bangalore-based BigBasket.

One reason why no e-grocery startup other than BigBasket has managed to raise money is that margins are wafer-thin. "At a gross margin of 12 to 15 per cent, profitability cannot be more than two per cent," says Gaurav Saraf, Director of Epiphany Ventures, a venture capital firm. The gross margin on fast-moving consumer goods is as low as 14 per cent. On fruit and vegetables, it is around 16 per cent but shelf life is shorter. This is why many sites, including MyGrahak and FamilyKart, stay away from fresh produce. BigBasket, however, says it has no problem. "Fruit and vegetables are procured only on order, except for those with a longer shelf life, such as potatoes and onions," says Menon. "This reduces loss of stock by three to four per cent."

One of the biggest rivals of e-grocers is the local kirana store, which offers home delivery in many cities, often within an hour. But Ascent Capital's Mittal says kirana shops lack the cost advantages to offer customers the best price, and cannot stock a wide range of products. BigBasket tries to consolidate orders in a locality and reach the customer in eight to 24 hours. But is that enough? Manohar Mason, Managing Director of Pentagon Communications, a marketing and consulting firm, doesn't think so. He says: "People can wait for books, but not groceries."

E-grocers are more likely to get repeat purchases than online retailers of other products. BigBasket says 65 per cent of its 3,000 customers are repeat buyers. But this also means egrocers must be on their toes. "If you can satisfy a busy customer, you're in for a huge opportunity," says Mason. Many investors doubt whether e-grocers can scale up. "This category cannot rely on a hub-and-spoke model, unlike apparel or electronics," says Mukul Singhal, Vice President of SAIF Partners, a venture capital firm. A book or an iPod can be sent by air across the country more easily than a 10 kg package of groceries.

"To reach Rs 100 crore in revenue, you must be present across the country," says Epiphany Ventures's Saraf. "Supply chain challenges are different in Bangalore and Gurgaon. You cannot replicate your model." So, while Jhunjhunwala expects MyGrahak to turn profitable by end-2012, he has no expansion plans.

Goel of FamilyKart says scaling up in other cities makes sense only after it has fully penetrated the area it currently operates in. But it is debatable whether volumes alone can make a venture profitable. Started in 2007, Britain's biggest e-grocer, Ocado, executes more than 9,000 orders a day, but struggles to make a profit. California-based Webvan started in 1999 and went bankrupt in 2001. It delivered fresh produce in 26 cities, but ran aground partly because it could not keep its promise of delivery in 30 minutes.

To boost margins, Indian e-grocers concentrate on monthly rather than daily purchases. A second strategy is to sell products with higher margins. Margins on pet food, for instance, can go up to 30 per cent. "The contribution of such items to sales is over six per cent, and we plan to raise it to 15 per cent," says Jhunjhunwala, whose monthly sales turnover averaged more than Rs 1 crore a month in the past year.

A third strategy is to sell inhouse brands, which improves margins by 20 to 25 per cent on staples. "We sell 7,000 SKUs, of which 300 are our own branded staples," says Menon of BigBasket. SKU or stockkeeping unit is the retail term for product identification code.

E-grocers get fewer deliveries returned than other online sellers - two to three per cent. The overall retail average is over 10 per cent. Most returns are because the customer was not available to receive the package. Chennai-based e-grocer Veggibazaar, which sells fresh produce, asks customers to indicate where orders can be delivered if they are not available - with a neighbour, maybe, or the security staff.

Perhaps the biggest threat to egrocers is giants such as the Future Group, which is testing a hybrid model to sell groceries online and in brick-and-mortar stores. Kashyap Deora, President of FutureBazaar. com, the group's online arm, which started selling groceries online in January, says: "We are doing pilots in 30 stores in Mumbai to check the feasibility of shipping online orders from the stores."

Saraf of Epiphany Ventures cites the success of British retailer Tesco, which operates offline and online. "It suggests that a hybrid model works best for grocery," he says. "A startup can't compete on procurement with a Reliance Retail, which has the entire supply chain mapped out." Sourcing efficiencies allow big retailers to offer discounts. BigBasket's Menon is undaunted.

"Once we have volumes, we'll try to move up the supply chain," he says. But BigBasket is the only e-grocer with funding. Its rivals will not be able to expand unless they attract investment. Newcomers such as FamilyKart are aware the clock is ticking. "We have a small window of opportunity," says Goel. "In a year we will have to be at a level where we can survive even if the big guns enter."

Buying grocery now has a tech edge

Basically, it operates in the same way as you do railway or air bookings. But what takes the cake is there are no extra costs involved and the products get delivered right at your doorstep.What augurs well for the consumer is the competition is building up as more and more players try to wean away customers by lining up hefty discounts and other promotional features in an attempt to corner a bigger chunk of market share. Shailaja Sharmatakes a closer look.

When Vikrant Joshi, an advertising professional in Mumbai, stopped by the kirana store in his locality for a loaf of bread and some eggs, he was in for a pleasant surprise — the shopkeeper informed him that he could order his supplies online which would be home delivered. On top of it, the shopkeeper followed up his chat by offering his business card which carried the website address to place such orders.

Joshi’s neighbourhood fuddy-duddy kirana store is part of about 1,600 others across the country that are now delivering groceries at consumer door-steps through orders placed on AaramShop.com, a company that partners with local kirana and medical stores to sell food and grocery online. With a footprint across 24 cities, AaramShop is now looking to bring in 20,000 shops under its coverage to become the largest e-grocer in the country.

The modus operandi is like this. When a consumer makes an order on the website, he can select the shop nearest to his home for delivery. The shopkeeper is alerted about the order through an e-mail followed by an SMS and a call from AaramShop’s call centre. The waiting time is around 3-4 hours before the order can be delivered.

Unlike a typical e-commerce transaction, the company does not charge anything from the kirana stores or even from customers. Instead, it is looking to make money directly from brands by providing them with analytics of consumer behaviour so that they can figure out buyers’ brand preference.

AaramShop is not sitting on its laurels, which is launching Aaram TV, a concept for in-store advertising of brands where product companies can pay for advertisements to be run on screens at mom-n-pop stores so as to attract consumers. Up next are mobile apps for kirana store owners which will alert them about orders on their mobile screens. Vijay Singh, chief executive officer and MD, an entrepreneur for 15 years, started AaramShop last year, along with a team of friends.

The funds are flowing, with Bangalore-based grocery e-tailer bigbasket.com recently securing some venture capital funding. A host of other websites like mygrahak.com and easyration.com in Delhi NCR, kiranawalla.com in Bangalore, freshndaily.com in Mumbai and chennaionlinegrocery.com in Chennai are already selling food, grocery and fresh supplies with free delivery within 24-48 hours of order, cash on delivery facility and discounts.

On an average, a city household spends Rs4,000-5,000 a month on groceries. Retailers believe the top 20 towns offer huge growth potential as spends on FMCG products are seen going up.

According to KPMG’s calculations, food and grocery retail in India is currently estimated to be $250 billion in size and expected to grow at rate of 6-8% on real term basis. Of this market, share of organised retail is estimated to be only 3% currently, but likely to double to 6% by 2015-16.

But the point is why would consumers use the web instead of making a call to their local kirana store. Ashutosh Malik, director and chief operating officer, AaramShop, points to the hectic schedule of the working class which finds ordering its weekly supplies online an easier option. For the traditional retailers, this is an opportunity to bolster sales. “The neighbourhood has over the years seen a slump in orders. They understand the competition from modern trade and are embracing the technology to stay ahead,” adds Malik.

He points to the format’s convenience factor when he says even FMCG companies are excited by a model like AaramShop as it provides them with last mile connect with consumers. Companies can communicate to buyers directly at the point where the purchase is being made. AaramShop is banking on these consumer brands to advertise on its site and buy into the data it collates from the cities it caters to.

When consumers order for products with a call to their kirana store, the average order size is at about Rs200. But while buying online, consumers are able to do impulse purchases, with as many as 30 product categories, Malik says. “An average order on our site is Rs570,” he says.

The road ahead is not without some sticking points though. “Online retail becomes popular in categories that can offer convenience, comparison and price advantage. Although online retail presents a significant potential, food and grocery online retailing has significant challenges related to managing the supply chain, low margins and limited shelf-life of fresh produce,” said Mohit Bahl, partner, KPMG, transactions services. In Bahl’s view, penetration of online food and grocery formats in mature markets has been limited, with major hurdles being supply chain-related issues.

Some experts say even as Indian consumers have comfortably adopted online stores for their apparel and electronics purchases, grocery is a different ballgame as consumers prefer to handpick their food and items of daily necessities, whether it’s scurrying across store aisles or ordering weekly supplies over the phone.
Malik of AaramShop admits that a majority of online grocery formats have failed to take off in a big way in many markets — these have stumbled in the US even. Unlike books which come with higher margins, grocery retailing fetches margins below 15% and usually in single digits. That, coupled with challenges in setting up an orderly supply chain, makes the model unviable.

What consumers seek from their mom-n-pop shop is convenience of home delivery and option of credit, and from hypermarkets, an option to have all products under one roof, lower prices, and of course, a wide variety. Their demand from from e-commerce grocers will be a mix of all these.

TECHNOLOGY AS CHANGE AGENT

Tech Drives Growth in Grocery E-tailing
Supply-chain tech helps to reduce cost & inventory and predict user behaviour

Everyday, I learn something new,” says R Rammurthy as he picks up a netbook, an Android tablet and a paper-clip file before climbing onto the driver's seat of a white Maruti van loaded with four neatly packed baskets of grocery and vegetables. As he slips into first gear, he pointed to the netbook screen which displayed a map where the vehicle’s number flashed. The on-screen status of the vehicle changed from idle to moving and the address to which the baskets needs to be delivered popped up.
Rammurthy’s trip ended nearly twenty minutes later at the doorsteps of a customer-- mother of a three-year-old who hates to spend the little spare time she gets during weekends at the supermarket. During the drive, the 28-year-old management graduate, who now handles a small team for online retailer Bigbasket.com, started explaining how his company manages to keep near-zero inventory and fulfils hundreds of orders everyday.
Online food and grocery retailing, fairly mature in the West and showing lot of potential in growth markets like China, has not been able to capture the fancy of Indian shoppers yet. Things, however, may be changing as a new generation of wellfunded online firms -- Bigbasket.com is a key example -- are using simple end-to-end technology solutions to offer deep discounts on grocery items, predict customer behaviour and keep a tight leash on expenses. With technology playing a key role, they are trying to make a dent in the estimated $343-billon food and grocery market in India.
For example, these firms use a supplychain technology that allow customers to place orders through multiple channels and later predict what a customer is likely to order. Combined with applications that track everything from the time an order is placed to delivery and devices that help during procurement, technology is helping these firms to make a compelling and convenient offer to the tech-savvy shopper. For these online retailers, the most important tech application is the ability to predict customer behaviour which lets them reduce inventory and thereby, cut costs. For instance, while a traditional retailer might have to stock his monthly offtake of atta at least three weeks in advance, an online retailer ends up stocking it for less than two days. “That is mostly analytics,” says Ambuj Jhunjhunwala, the founder of Mygrahak.com which sells food and grocery online in Delhi. Predicting customer needs helps them to plan in advance and procure based on needs. Need-based procurement works ideally well with perishable goods like food not to talk about saving expenses on storage space, which is a large part of expenditure for a traditional retailer.
Analytics also involves knowing the customer better which helps retailers to make tailor-made offers for customers and increase sales. Online retailers can also eliminate a large part of their frontline staff because customers usually help themselves. Typically, large format brickand-mortar stores spend much of their attention to figure out customer behaviour on the shopping floor and arrange goods so that they catch customer attention. This can now be automated as the platform generates enough data about individual preferences. “You have complete control over knowing what your customer is buying and great level of predictability. The stickiness of forecasting can go up as you use technology to predict,” says Anand Ramanathan, Associate Director at KPMG.
Shoppers, whose experience of buying grocery online has been good, tend to very loyal. For example, Asha Liju, a clinical research professional from Bangalore buys her grocery online. “This is the second time I’m buying online because its simple and saves me nearly 10 kilometres of travel,” she says.
Here again, technology plays a key role. Grocery buying is mostly a repetitive task something technology is known to do well. For instance, when a shopper logs into the account, a history of previously bought items makes it easier to pick instead of going through the motion all over again. “At each step, simple technology is helping us save time and money,” says Abhinay Choudhary, co-founder of Bigbasket.com. Bigbasket.com, which now has 100 people on its rolls, will supply anything from milk products to fresh fruits among 7,000 other items at your doorstep at competitive prices within a few hours of placing an e-order. “Our delivery vans even have cold storage facilities. This is very new but if we do it right, it will be big," says Choudhary. His earlier venture was shopasyoulike, a similar food and grocery store catering to residents in Whitefield, Bangalore.
25-year-old Jhunjhunwala’s Mygrahak-.com now claims that they process nearly 15,000 orders a month. “The average order size is Rs 1,250- Rs 1,300 . We can at least grow 30 times in Delhi alone,” he said. He recently introduced “card on delivery,” where a customer can swipe their cards at the time of delivery to pay for the order. Jhunjhunwala comes from a family of entrepreneurs and returned to India after graduation learning how to do business from his family, the promoters of BSE listed REI Agro. Chennaionlinegrocery.com, Town Essentials and Atmydoorsteps.com also operate in this space. Scale might not be an issue as demand from a large working population, which finds frequenting supermarkets an irritant, grows.
Investors also seem to be buying into the grocery e-tailing story. Last month, private equity firm Ascent Capital invested $10 million when Bigbasket.com co-founded by a team of eight which includes Fab-Mall co-founders Hari Menon, VS Sudhakar, Vipul Parekh, VS Ramesh and Abhinay Choudhary, raised its first round of institutional funding.
The food and grocery market accounts for over two thirds of the $505 billion Indian retail market. According to retail consultancy Technopak, the retail market is projected to touch $725 billion by 2017. The organised food and grocery retail market in India is estimated at $ 12 billion in 2012 and grow at a compounded rate of 30% over next the five years. "Though e-tailing is still a very small part of retail in India it is projected to grow at a fast pace and over the next decade its presence will be significant," said Pragya Singh, Principal Consultant, Retail & Consumer Products, Technopak. Headroom for growth comes from the fact that that e-tailing accounts for a measly. 2% or $1 billion of the overall retail market and it is expected to reach $13 billion by 2017.
But retailing food and grocery online is not an easy task. Though there are success stories, the monumental failure of Webvan in the United States back in 2000 is enough to act as a damperner.
The challenges include being able to give consumers a large number of products to choose from, achieving consistency in quality especially when it comes to perishable goods and the cost of logistics. For instance, Mygrahak’s Jhunjhunwala has already invested $1 milllon in the firm and anticipates an expense of $4 million to $5 million every time it moves to a new city. While critics often cite the example of Webvan, the story may not repeat in India. Webvan may not be the best benchmark, argues Singh. “It is an example of a company that grew too fast in middle of the dotcom boom, rapid expansion to multiple cities, gigantic infrastructure including warehouses but not enough sales to back the same,” she said.
Even as its spends Rs 150- Rs 400 to acquire each customer, Mygrahak.com will break even this Diwali, claims Jhunjunwala. Despite the rosy numbers, e-tailers looking to sell food and grocery might have to expand cautiously, suggests Technopak’s Singh.
The Challenges
Achieving standardisation
in quality and quantity when a large part of grocery items are still sold loose in India
Having a comprehensive product range that covers all possible variations
Delivery across large parts of urban and semi-urban areas
Sensory needs of consumers are not satisfied through online channels
Fulfilment and logistics costs More:http://epaper.timesofindia.com

Top 10 Trends In Indian E-commerce In 2010

2010 has been defining for the Indian e-commerce sector, which has (and some may sigh “finally”) come of age with much of the evolution being clearly visible this year. Though a fairly old industry in India, this sector has caught the fancy of investors and has generated multiple entrepreneurial avenues, riding on macro trends such as increase in broadband penetration, change in buying patterns and the success of group buying sites globally. So, what did we see this year?

Most significantly, travel site MakeMyTrip’s listing at the Nasdaq spurred the interest of many an investor as they saw a clear potential of a liquidation event. 2010 also nearly double of number of M&As (25) compared to 2009 (11), according to data compiled by our financial research platform VCCEdge. In this backdrop, VCCircle spots some key trends, including M&As and private equity fund-raising, in the e-commerce space in 2010 that will have a bearing on the way the industry evolves in 2011 and beyond.

Categories that are flying: Domestic entrepreneurs are raring to set up online stores mimicking global ecommerce sites. The top categories within e-commerce, investors say, are travel, classifieds, group buying, auto sales and luxury brands.

Travel, the big e-commerce story: The catalyst for e-commerce, one category which is largely responsible for making users more comfortable with online transactions is travel. Top players such as IRCTC, Makemytrip.com, Yatra.com and Cleartrip.com are witnessing a boom in online ticketing sales and are expanding their portfolio of services to add hotel booking and packages. Makemytrip India Pvt. Ltd. acquired online bus ticketing company Ticketvala.com from Mumbai-based Travis Internet Pvt. Ltd. in March 2010 and in August had a high profile listing on NASDAQ. In October, Yatra Online Pvt Ltd, the owners of Yatra.com, picked up a stake in Travel Services International Pvt Ltd, a wholesale ticket consolidator. B2B travel network Via and bus ticketing service Redbus.in are also making inroads and experimenting with new services.

Travel sites are also spending more online and spent a total of Rs 59 crore on display ads in fiscal 2010, according to the IAMAI.

Exclusive book retail not sustainable: Flipkart, which set out as book retailing portals, has spread out to cover other products as plain vanilla book selling is not sustainable business. “Books were a good hook to draw in users but on its own, book retailing online is not a scalable business. It will work online but can never become very big as the average book value in India is very low. That is why sites like Flipkart and Infibeam are expanding into other categories,” said Suvir Sujan, Partner, Nexus Venture Partners. The site also sells movie and music DVDs, games and consoles and mobile handsets. Infibeam has expanded similarly with used cars and bike classifieds.

Indians love discounts: Having received high valuations, deal sites and voucher-based ecommerce is the flavour of the year with domestic startups mimicking global sites, primarily Groupon.com. “Indians like deals, so daily deal sites will continue to attract users,” says Rajan Anandan, an angel investor. Sites such as Snapdeal.com, Mydala.com and Dealsandyou.com have established themselves and a slew of more daily, localised deal sites are cropping up such as DealMagic and Koovs. According to Harjiv Singh, who is exploring global markets with his Comparenbuy.co.uk rather than India, the Indian e-commerce space is not ready as yet for serious e-commerce players. He explains, “There are too many players right now in the industry and the customers are not sophisticated enough. India will be ready in 3-5 years and by then we will see only a few ones still standing - only those who build it up will get brand recall. In India, it will be a numbers game, with the ones who win getting the most number of merchants, deals and users.”

But we also like fashion: Today eBay acquired Germany’s fashion and lifestyle shopping site brands4friends.com for $200 million, to foray into the hottest sector in ecommerce – high end luxury portals. In India, sites such as 99labels.com, exclusively.in and Fashionandyou.com are competing in this segment. In November, Accel India Venture Fund and Helion Advisors Pvt. Ltd. invested $2.8 million in Exclusively.In, Inc. followed by Sequoia Capital infusing $8 million in Fashionandyou.com. Anandan warned that retailers tend to be laggards when it comes to technology – and this will prove to be an issue for e-commerce players.

Strategic shifts: General e-commerce has shifted from being a horizontal space to vertical and shopping sites such as Indiatimes Shopping and Rediff Shopping need a total makeover. On the other hand, many portals are expanding horizontally - take Yebhi for example. Bigshoebazaar was recently rebranded as Yebhi - it no longer is a shoe-only store and also sells accessories, bags and clothing.

Classifieds going strong: Jobs, real estate, matrimonial continue to see traction. Linkedin, Naukri and Monster.com have top-recall followed by TimesJobs.com and Shine.com by HT Media. Matrimonial sites such as Consim Info Pvt Ltd’s Bharatmatrimony.com, Shaadi.com and Jeevansathi.com continue to reign. Naspers Ltd infused $40 million into the Nexus-backed OLX and in July, Mid-Day
Infomedia Ltd. acquired SnatchKing Online Pvt. Ltd. In August, Naaptol Online received $7 million in venture capital funding from Canaan Advisors Pvt Ltd while Nexus India Capital Advisors Pvt Ltd invested $1.5 million in Magic Rooms Solutions, which offers an online hotel inventory distribution software. Carwale.com’s auto classifieds business was acquired by Axel Springer and India Today, and other websites such as eBay Motors, Gaadi.com, Carazoo, Zigwheels and Automartindia are players in this space.

What is in store: Large e-commerce companies in India will need to spend heavily on infrastructure over the next three years to maintain momentum. Despite shipping delays, billing errors, poor user interfaces, checkout issues, the perception of online transactions not being secure and the continued lack of bandwidth, the mood of e-commerce players is one of optimism as they wait for 3G networks to roll out.

Competition and hype: Competition will continue to be heated and only few will survive. Shailendra Singh, MD of Sequoia Capital India says, “There is too much hype around e-commerce right now and many investors will lose their money investing in e-commerce because too many companies are trying to raise capital and we already see signs of very intense competition. In such an environment, market leaders have an unfair advantage because the whole industry will educate the market and drive adoption and the market leaders will get disproportionate benefit from it. We believe the market leader in each category will generate the lion's share of value for shareholders.”

Consolidation, will it happen: Industry experts are unanimous in the view that consolidation is still a far cry in the nascent industry. Salwan said, there are no cash flows for the next 2-5 years and hence there will be no consolidation. We might not see the likes of Amazon taking over Quidsi, the operator of Diapers.com and Soap.com for $500 million in the near future, but $100-$200 million deals can be expected to take place in the next two years, according to Anandan.

Christian Festivals in India

Christian Festivals in India - India is not only a land of varying topographical features, but also a home to people belonging to different religions and ethnicity. The Indian Constitution has defined the country as a secular nation, hence people following different religions coexist in harmony here. As every religion is associated with a number of colorful festivals, it is a treat to eye and a wonderful experience for the soul to see people celebrating festivals in myriad ways. Though Hinduism is the dominant religion, all the important festivals of the other religions are also celebrated with equal enthusiasm and lavishness. A considerable number of Indians also follow Christianity and celebrate various Christian festivals. Christmas, Easter and Good Friday are some of the most famous festivals celebrated with pomp and gaiety. Not only the Christians, but also their friends and acquaintance from other religions soak themselves in the celebrations of the Christian festivals.

There are a number of places in India, where Christian festivals are celebrated on a grand manner. Goa, an erstwhile Portuguese colony, deserves a special mention here. Goa, the smallest Indian state, boasts the oldest and most beautiful Indian churches. These Churches celebrate the regular Christian festivals and also give equal treatment to other auspicious days in the Christian calendar by feasting, prayers and processions. Many other states also celebrate these great occasions with immense fanfare.

Christmas, as we all know, is a prominent Christian festival, and is celebrated with great enthusiasm across the length and breadth of the country. Easter and Good Friday are also observed with equal respect and religious touch. Schools and other educational institutions remain closed on both the festivals. Here we have provided below a list of famous Christian festivals of India.


Christian Festival Calender 2012
Christian Holiday Dates in 2012

January 2012 01 Sunday New Year

February 2012 14 Tuesday Valentine's Day

March 2012 18 Sunday Mothering Sunday (UK)

April 2012 01 Sunday Palm Sunday (Western)

06 Friday Good Friday

08 Sunday Easter (Western)
May 2012 13 Sunday Mother's Day

June 2012 17 Sunday Father's Day

August 2012 05 Sunday Friendship Day

October 2012 31 Wednesday Halloween

November 2012 22 Thursday Thanksgiving Day
30 Friday St Andrews Day

December 2012 08 Saturday Feast of the Immaculate Conception
08 Saturday Chanukah/Hanukkah(After sunset) (Till 16th December)
25 Tuesday Christmas