Going from a 2-man show to a team of 60, from processing 2 to 2,000 orders a day, the growth story of Flipkart Sellers Abhishek and Saurav Raid is truly extraordinary. Find out how they leveraged digital commerce and made the most of Flipkart’s insights to achieve a 10-year triumph on the 10th anniversary of the Big Billion Days sale!
Flipkart Sellers Abhishek and Saurav Raid started on their voyage with entrepreneurship very early in life with just one destination in mind – to achieve their aspirations of building a national brand. That’s precisely what they did in 10 years, surging ahead by learning on the job.
From women to men and college-goers, their storage and kitchenware solutions enjoy a diverse customer base all across India, with e-commerce by their side. Together, these brothers, business partners and Flipkart Sellers, scripted a success story 10 years in the making. Here it is in Abhishek’s own words.
A 10-year journey with Flipkart begins with a shot in the dark
This year, it has been 10 years since my brother Saurav and I started our journey with Flipkart. Together, we run Raid International, and the past decade has been an exciting ride for us.
I was studying to be an engineer and simultaneously exploring the home and kitchen product category. At the time, I was 22 and my brother was 16. He was studying to be an interior designer, and we both dreamed of making it big as entrepreneurs.
At first, I was supplying products I imported to retailers in Bengaluru. I had built relationships with a lot of brands, and that was when I met a few people from Flipkart, who told me to list these products on the online marketplace. At that time, brands were not really selling online, so I thought, why not try e-commerce as something new? That was the best thing we ever did, and that is how we started – with 1 single brand on Flipkart.
Riding the wave as Flipkart Sellers
From 2013 to now, our growth has been tremendous. We went from processing 2 orders a day to 2,000 orders a day! Earlier, we used to procure products, pack on our own and even dispatch ourselves. In fact, I remember I was in college and calling up Saurav to say that we received our first order online! This is how we started.
Today, we have a team of 60 with accounting, operations and packaging teams. We also have multiple warehouses through which we operate and have a presence in multiple zones. We expanded our products from a single brand to multiple brands.
We have also launched our own brand and even got into manufacturing. We manufacture a range of products like water bottles, storage containers, lunch boxes and more. For our brand KenBerry, we manufacture kitchen utensils too. Every year, our goal is to develop new products and be trendsetters.
At Flipkart, the numbers we saw were really high right from the start, and I cannot imagine achieving these figures otherwise. In the past, we would have to deliver to physical stores, pay to get our products on the shelves, hire and train promoters and salespeople and still be restricted to Bengaluru. As Flipkart sellers, all these costs and efforts come down to zero. We are not restricted to one city, do not have all these additional costs and, best of all, are open 24X7!
Sleepless Nights for Dreamers
The Big Billion Days is one of the biggest sales festivals for us. As Flipkart sellers, we work in anticipation 6 months before BBD begins. We require this time as we manufacture in-house and export products for the sale. During BBD, neither my brother nor I get enough sleep!
However, we love the excitement. We get up at 1 am to check the number of orders we have, we get up at 2 am, and again at 3 am, and it’s a lot of fun! We don’t have a relaxed moment until a few weeks after Diwali because our busy season continues until then.
Without Flipkart, our growth would not be the same. Firstly, being Flipkart sellers, we get insights from the support team about which product is selling well and which category we can expand in. This helps us make the right moves as business owners.
We also get exposure to new brands that we want to retail online. The advertisement platform that we have access to on Flipkart is really great. Without it, if we had to promote our product pan-India, it wouldn’t have been possible. With Flipkart’s support, we have taken our brand to the national level.
Looking back, I would say our growth has been 100% each year for the past 10 years! And we aren’t done yet. In the next 2 years, we are planning to triple our growth. We also want to become stronger in manufacturing and scale our setup. When it comes to BBD, it is our 10th year and BBD’s 10th anniversary, so we expect no less than 10X growth!
To read more stories of Flipkart Sellers like Abhishek and Saurav Raid, click here.
