Ever since the rise of eCommerce players—especially biggies like Flipkart and Amazon—offline retailers have taken a huge hit. The plethora of choices and ease of buying that eCommerce facilitates has made it a habit for many. Added to the inherent benefits of eCommerce is the fact that barriers to the internet are increasingly being lowered, resulting in ever-deepening penetration. In fact, according to a RedSeer report, India’s internet adoption reached 530 million at a run rate of 65 million users per year over the last two years. With more retail players tapping into the growth of the internet, the brick-and-mortar ones have no option but to take to the online channel to continue growing. Facilitating this process of transition and growth for India’s retailers is Mumbai-based startup CoutLoot, a social-commerce offline-to-online (O2O) platform focusing on small offline sellers. The Co-founder of CoutLoot, Jasmeet Thind, says, “We help these offline players sell online for the first time by automatically cataloging their offline inventory and providing logistics, payment, and reconciliation support.” Instead of forcing traditional businesses to adopt completely modern practices, CoutLoot’s platform integrates certain offline buyer-seller behaviors. Offline sellers can simply list their products on the platform and sell them after striking a deal with potential customers by bargaining over chat in regional languages. CoutLoot, an abbreviation of ‘Couture and Loot’, aims at making “style cheap and accessible to all”, explains Jasmeet.
Mahima Kaul, Vinit Jain, and Jasmeet Thind, the Founders of CoutLoot.
Read more at https://yourstory.com/2019/10/tech30-social-commerce-startup-coutloot-offline-online