distribution – Dutch Uncles

Teabox Innovating How Tea is Sold in India

Vaishali Das — Fri, 09 Jul 2021 04:29:39 +0000

The most generally consumed refreshment on the planet close to water, Tea is still to a great extent produced and distributed much as it was two centuries ago, often at the expense of freshness. Teabox, a Siliguri-based startup catering to a worldwide market of tea lovers by bringing the fresh tea leaves straight from the estates to the consumer in no time.

About Teabox and Its Specialty

By fusing tea with technology, Kaushal Dugar, founder and CEO of Teabox, is transforming the practices around tea production and distribution. It brings the freshness of tea leaves straight from the farm to the consumer’s cup within days after it is picked. The startup majorly focuses on providing customers with more approachable ways to explore different varieties, regions, and flavours of tea just like wine.

The startup deals on the vertical integration of sourcing, branding, and distribution of teas. By infusing family’s teachings of the old tea trade with technology and new ways of doing business, Kaushal Dugar created India’s first global tea brand.

Best Quality and Marketing Strategy

Teabox’s major source of producing tea is from Darjeeling, Assam, Nilgiris in Tamilnadu and Nepal. It took the basic idea of using the online platform for selling tea as it is done for coffee and wines. This strategy aimed to reduce the time from production to consumption and hence provides tea in its purest form without any intermediaries. With having over 200 variants of tea including Punjabi masala and Kolkata Street chai, the startup is very famous at an international level, amongst the coffee drinking market.

The startup took the inspiration from the rich and visual history of tea production, including the colonial-era typography that is still very much prevalent in tea crates. The simplicity of the Teabox website lies in its accessibility with easy-to-use format, quickly giving out information about the incredible range of teas. Teabox also provides its consumers with the opportunity to select their own tea combinations by taking up its subscriptions.

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The simplicity of the Teabox website lies in its accessibility with easy-to-use format, quickly giving out information about the incredible range of teas.

What Differentiates Teabox from the others in the Market?

Teabox is a direct-to-consumer e-commerce tea startup that cuts down the supply chain and makes it a simpler and faster process.

It uses a fairly straightforward model of sourcing the highest quality tea directly from the tea estates and delivering it to the consumers within 5-7 business days.
The startup has an in-built software that maps every step from procurement of tea from the tea estate to delivering it to the customer.
Providing customers with a subscription-based service where they can taste different varieties before settling on their favorites is another great strategy.
They also provide customers with “TeaPacs”, transforming a 50-year-old invention of tea bags. Unlike teabags, TeaPacs are infused with nitrogen gas to keep tea fresh as much as possible.
Its modern and minimalistic packaging includes loose tea leaves well preserved with natural nitrogen flush that locks down the freshness of the leaves.

Insights For Startups in the Tea Selling Space

As the industry has picked up a substantial raise in the lockdown, tea has become the healthier beverage with antiviral properties. The use of a digital platform for selling tea, Teabox, has created a niche for buyers, providing them a brand-new experience of ordering and tasting a variety of teas.

Teabox also educates customers through its platform providing them knowledge about the specialty teas in India and giving the valued customers a chance of ‘experiential’ tea-drinking, a shift from the traditional way of tea consumption.

The post Teabox Innovating How Tea is Sold in India appeared first on Dutch Uncles.

What Are the New Distribution Channels for Fintech?

Shalmoli Sarkar — Fri, 09 Apr 2021 06:35:04 +0000

The financial services in India are rapidly moving towards digitisation. The financial services in India are drifting from the conventional ‘one size for all’ to a more personalised approach. Increased e-commerce shopping, convenience of payments, increasing smartphones usage, slashed data plans and emphasising on contactless payments in the pandemic are the tailwinds for the growth of fintech sector in India. According to BCG (Boston Consulting Group) report the fintech sector estimated valuation is $150-160 Billion by 2025. Pay cuts, layoffs, less revenues, increasing health expenses in the pandemic is forcing people to revisit their insurance, loans and other monetary plans. This becomes an opportunity for the fintech sector to solve people’s worries effectively and expand user base. To do so, the fintech sector is exploring new distribution channels for acquiring customers.

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According to BCG (Boston Consulting Group) report the fintech sector estimated valuation is $150-160 Billion by 2025.

New Distribution Channels for Fintech

Collaborating with Banks

Fintech companies are collaborating with reputed insurance companies in India to sell their policies and sustain growth. Leveraging the already established customer base of the insurance companies the fintech companies can expand their user base. The tie-up of insurance companies with fintech apps can simplify the entire customer journey in insurance right from purchases to claims within the comfort of click which otherwise was cumbersome by cold calls. 2021 witnessed many such instances of collaborations such as ICICI Prudential has partnered with PhonePe to sell term life insurance plans. Customers need not have to endure the gruelling paperwork and need not to go through traditional health check-up. The entire insurance policy can be completed by the app. On a similar note, to make available its insurance products digitally in Tier-II and Tier-III cities Airtel payments has partnered with Bharti AXA.

Through OTT Platforms

The work-from-model and decreased out-of-home consumption has led to an unprecedented rise of viewership in OTT platforms. Witnessing the uptick of by subscription – payment model in the entertainment space, Splitsub a combinator backed fintech startup is revamping the OTT subscription payment by letting split the costs of OTT subscriptions among friends and family. On Splitsub there are more than 90 OTT players and work-related platform such as Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Grammarly, Otter etc. whose subscription can be split. It is a marketplace of OTT platforms that handles the payments of OTT platforms.

Through e-commerce

SEBI’s initiative to reduce the cost structure of mutual funds has allowed e-commerce companies such as Flipkart to sell mutual funds through its fintech arm PhonePe. Automation of mutual fund sales including e-KYC will reduce the cost of mutual fund schemes, will eliminate the fees that needed to pay the intermediaries, thus making it easier for investors to buy mutual fund products.

Social Media Platforms

What began as a platform for fun and meeting your long-distance friends is now a platform that is now looked upon as a customer acquisition platform by the financial institutions and banks. Various financial institutions and banks are experimenting with social media payments, game-based insurance application and interactive wealth management and investment apps for the digital-savvy population. With creative posts and digital advertising, social media has the ability to catch the audience’s attention.

Digital Insurance Apps

Digital Insurance apps such as Policybazaar.com, Coverfox, Acko offers a consolidated platform that enables customers to search, compare, find and buy insurance products at affordable premiums from multiple carriers. Customers from such apps can make informed decisions by comparing all the products for a financial stream from a single platform. These apps can also claim initiation and settlement digitally which enhances customer satisfaction.

What is in it for Fintech companies?

With Gen Z becoming the future consumers of fintech, it is known that their affinity is more towards the gadget and internet. To acquire customers, it is imperative for the fintech companies to leverage the above-mentioned new distribution channels for the usage of various financial products and services.

The post What Are the New Distribution Channels for Fintech? appeared first on Dutch Uncles.

Set Up Distribution Channels to Grow Your Revenue

DU Desk — Sat, 19 Dec 2020 04:20:20 +0000

If you purchased an item from Amazon and had the package home-delivered, you could be somewhat familiar with the concept of distribution channels. You will rarely find business owners glamorising how they build distribution channels (how they raise funding or tell stories on social media usually tops that list of achievement). But you need several distribution channels to ensure multiple revenue streams and grow your business.

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Getting the product to the end-user is as important as the product itself. This is why you need a good distribution channel in place.

So, What Is Distribution?

Now that you have procured raw materials and developed the goods/services, it is time to go to market and sell them – either directly via the Web, your sales force or retail outlets or indirectly through wholesalers, distributors and the likes. Think of it as business networks through which your products or services will reach all end users. In business jargon, these networks are called distribution channels.

A typical business will use both direct and indirect channels for quicker market access and rise in sales. Take, for instance, any famous cosmetics brand. One can buy its products online, at the company’s retail centres or at the local shop/supermarket. Understandably, the latter gets the stock through indirect distribution, mostly through wholesalers, distributors, dealers and other middle agencies.

Now, let us take a look at the distributors. They are the middle agencies which buy products from manufacturers and sell them to the wholesalers that buy and sell the products to retail stores in bulk. Sometimes the distributor will bypass the whole seller and opt for multiple dealers instead, who specialise in a niche market and deal with very specific products. For a distributor to do their job effectively they need to build and maintain relationships with the manufacturers and stay up-to-date on all the goings-on in the market.

Distributors also manage orders, oversee returns and even sell products on behalf of the brand at times. A good distributor has a thorough understanding of the market and uses that to prompt bigger sales.

Types Of Distribution

Direct

The product is directly delivered to customers or other businesses with no middle agencies involved. A good example of a direct channel is Sony it takes orders from customers directly through their website and has their company deliver it to the customer without an intermediary. These channels can be very effective in the long run. The company will have to spend more on storage and transport for the goods. The direct method is used mostly by businesses dealing in perishable goods, like farmers’ markets.

Indirect

This involves several middle agencies between the supplier and the final point of sales. This includes distributors, wholesalers, dealers, retailers, franchises and VARs (value-added resellers). Since there are so many channels to pass through and all of them have to be paid, the process sometimes ends up driving up the end-price for the customer by inflating the market price. The upside is that it won’t cost nearly as much as direct distribution channels, which means cost saved for the company.

Intensive

The goal here is to gain as much visibility in the market as possible, as fast as possible. This includes everyday consumer products like soaps, toothpaste, bread etc. The things that have a mass-sales capacity and move fast. The more places and the more often your customers see your product, the more likely they are to buy it. Brand awareness is the name of the game. There is a risk to playing it hard and fast: If you end up sending your product to a location where the competition enjoys better customer loyalty, you will run into a loss. Using this kind of distribution channel needs a watchful eye over the current market trends.

Selective

This is when the manufacturer sends the products to a select number of stores in specific locations, giving their brand a more premium feel. The manufacturer can control the price for a certain area and give those customers a personalised shopping experience. This method allows the brand a certain amount of edge over the competition since they can target specific areas where the competition may not have the best customer following. This method allows you the opportunity to target these weak spots in the market and use them to your advantage.

The Whirlpool company is a good example of this as they sell their appliances through dealer networks in specific areas where they can expect a better sales rate. These often include middle-to-high-income residential areas or office campuses where demand for air conditioners and other white goods will be high.

Exclusive

Manufacturers sell these items to a select number of middle-agencies. You get a better profit margin from luxury items. For example, Rolex, iPhones and supercars. With that being the case, there is no real need for intensive mass productions and sales like that of everyday items because the higher price tag makes up for it.

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There is no one single way to distribute your products or services, but it is important to know where to start. For that you need a solid strategy to build your distribution network.

How To Build Distribution Network

Find the market

Before you start forming any sort of distribution plan, you need to consider the market. Look at what your product is, and which demographic, in which area would find the most use for your product. Once you identify the need in the market and you know for sure that your product can meet those demands, only then do you move ahead.

Know your competition

Find out everything you can about the rival brands – look at what distribution strategy they use and how successful they are with those methods. This gives you a rough idea of how you could expect your product to perform once it hits the market. Let the enemy do the work for you.

Choose the best channel

Now comes the time to start laying the groundwork. You need to see which type of distribution channel would best suit your product and help it perform well in the market. If it is a top-of-the-line diamond-studded watch, you should choose an exclusive distribution channel that includes a select number of stores and customers. If it is ice cream soda, you may choose the intensive method to outshine your competition.

Whatever you choose, you not only need to make sure that it complements the type of product you are selling, but you also need to see if it falls within the budget. If not, you need to account for that and make the necessary adjustments, because what matters most is making sure that the product flies off the shelves at the end of the day.

Set up the chain

Now it is time to approach channel partners, but before you do, ask yourself: What is the logistics? You need to have a clear idea of how orders and return will be handled, if there will be storage needs, how the inventory will be accounted for and so on. Once you have the answer to these questions, you are ready to go.

Pricing and Revenue

You must support your channel partners and pay them for their services. Treat them as a business partner and as a customer. After all, they also have a business to run, so promote their businesses as well. Provide them with training and advertisement where you can to increase their internal efficiency.

No matter what you choose as your ideal strategy, make sure to keep tabs on the chain of distribution. Do a regular performance analysis. See if the customers are happy and if everything is performing as well as it should be.

Check out our article on ‘business automation’ to see how you can step up your business’s operations.

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