While browsing for online books today, suddenly came across infibeam.com... I used to think that flipkart was cheap, who else can offer books at 40% discount. And due to my mistaken notion, never thought of checking other ecommerce websites. But lola....enter infibeam.com and Homeshop18.com giving books the same books as flipkart at 50% discount. This makes me ponder if the buyers like were actually buying overpriced products before these ecommerce buzz set in or are flipkart and infibeam are fighting themselves to death. After a little search found an interesting blog
http://www.firstpost.com/business/flip-side-of-flipkart-red-ink-for-e-tailers-rip-book-shops-185400.html
Can't agree more with the writer of the above blog. A little search showed me that Amazon the world's largest ecommerce site has 14% expense for (in finance terms selling and administrative expense) running their operations. Now on a rs500 book on flipkart, there is usually a 40% discount. Add to that the courier charges of free shipping of rs20 by a conservative estimate plus say a 8% operational expense (assuming india is a low cost country and a 14% expense can be brought down to 8% in india); the total discount on the book amount to 500*.4+500*.08+20=260 (more than 50%). Lol, looks unsustainable by all measures.
These online portals will become ideal short sell once they get listed.....hope they survive long enough to get listed :)
http://www.firstpost.com/business/flip-side-of-flipkart-red-ink-for-e-tailers-rip-book-shops-185400.html
Can't agree more with the writer of the above blog. A little search showed me that Amazon the world's largest ecommerce site has 14% expense for (in finance terms selling and administrative expense) running their operations. Now on a rs500 book on flipkart, there is usually a 40% discount. Add to that the courier charges of free shipping of rs20 by a conservative estimate plus say a 8% operational expense (assuming india is a low cost country and a 14% expense can be brought down to 8% in india); the total discount on the book amount to 500*.4+500*.08+20=260 (more than 50%). Lol, looks unsustainable by all measures.
These online portals will become ideal short sell once they get listed.....hope they survive long enough to get listed :)
