Offline Retail is here to stay!

We have come to a Tier 3 town for our summer vacation where my wife has built her small, retirement home.

Srirangam is an island which houses the oldest temple shrine on earth, feat. Lord Vishnu in reclining form.

 

HE was the kula devata of none other than Lord Shri Rama during Treta Yuga.

 

As we had guests coming home, I placed a request with the senior management of Vasanth and Co. on Sunday morning.

 

Within a few mins, the Area Manager called me, shared models and prices and within an hour, I had placed the order.

 

This was at 12 noon.

 

The unit from BlueStar arrived by 1pm, the cashier from the store arrived a few mins later - yes, you read that right.

 

By 5pm, two boys came to install and by 8pm, the unit was functioning.

 

Meanwhile, the Area Manager and the store manager called me to follow up on the installation work being carried out.

 

Now, this is not just efficiency.

This is culture.

 

A culture of Customer-first approach.

A culture of walking the extra mile.

A culture of do what you can to delight them.

 

A salesman turned entrepreneur, Late Shri. Vasanth Kumar was considered the epitome of hardwork and dedication.

 

Now, his children Ms. Thangamalar Jaganath and Mr. Vijay Vasanth are continuing the tradition.

 

100s of e-commerce or quick commerce companies cannot solve this.

 

Why?

 

Most Apps do not have a human interface. And that makes all the difference.

 

While this is not new, many CDIT players are not embracing this level of customer excellence.

 

I hope they do more. Not just to acquire new customers, but also to retain existing ones!

Casenation Bloggers Meet

I was invited to attend a blogger meet a few days back, which was organized by Chennai's leading social Media Agency EchoVME's DInfluencer outfit. The location was none other than Coffee Tales, a neighborhood cafe tucked in the bylanes of Anna Nagar East. We were all seated by 6.30pm and in a few minutes, Sorav Jain of EchoVME gave an introduction about Casenation, a budding startup from Chennai which makes premium back cases for various smartphones. He showcased some unique products of the brand and later invited Amit, the Founder of Casenation to present the brand.

Amit introduced himself as a thoroughbred Madrasi with strong roots with the local culture. The BRand was incubated a few months back by his friends and him and they are currently self-funded. They have a manufacturing facility in the outskirts of the city and have a dedicated design team which creates unique and funky stuff periodically. They have cases for almost all smartphone brands and are increasing the portfolio regularly. On the distribution front, they are currently present online through their dedicated website http://www.casenation.in which seems to have a neat interface although they could add a lot more features such as add to cart from the product icon, compare products, etc. to name a few. 

They also have a physical presence at cafes such as Coffee Tales. Amit insists that this is a product that potential customers should touch and feel and hence they are focussing on offline expansion as well. This hybrid expansion, popularly known as Omni-Channel Retailing is fast catching with the likes of Croma and Ezone promoting a similar experience where customers can order online and collect the products offline.

Amit also proudly says all his products are locally sourced and manufactured giving a fillip to the Make In India Initiative that is promoted by the Narendra Modi Government. Later he showcased some of their unique products among which what caught most of my attention was a wireless charges for iPhones! A small extension needs to be added to the iPhone on the charging point and the phone needs to be just placed on the device - bingo! it gets charged... He also showed some very interesting wooden cases which were, though a tad expensive had a great fit and finish. 

Later, Team EchoVME organised an interesting game - one of us had to start a story with the imagery on the case we had and it goes on like a chain. We started about a girl imagining to visit India, riding on a bike to Ladakh and finally attaining nirvana at a Budhist Monastery and so on. Was a fun and interesting game. The evening ended with a bag full of goodies including a Parker Pen, a Leather Writing Pad and a Gift Voucher from Casenation to buy a case of our choice for ourselves or our loved ones, which was a kind gesture. Overall a very well organized event by Casenation & EchoVME. Look forward to catching up more with fellow bloggers soon!