Amazon India sees customer sentiment bounce back as retail restrictions ease

By

Isabelle Crossley

Published
Jun 10, 2021

Amazon India has seen its e-commerce customers take advantage of relaxing retail and lockdown regulations and has reported increased traffic across multiple product categories on its e-commerce store. 

“We see customers coming back and shopping for the kind of things they were shopping before the wave came in,” Amazon India’s country head Amit Agarwal told ET Tech. “This is also not a very long-drawn lockdown, like 55 days last year. We are beginning to see customers, as things open up, shop for the kind of things they shopped before.”
 
Numerous states and metros across India, including major consumption hub Delhi, are enabling people to shop for ‘non-essential’ goods online again including clothing, cosmetics, and electronics, some of Amazon India’s largest and most popular product categories. 

“Traffic continues to be robust and growing- people wanting to come online and shop,” said Agarwal. “We continue to see the growth that we were seeing before.”
 
Large e-commerce businesses including Amazon and its main competitor Flipkart were able to continue retail operations, although to a lesser degree than normal, in many states under lockdown where many smaller businesses were not. A number of traders’ bodies including the Confederation for All India Traders accused Amazon and Flipkart of violating regulations and continuing to deliver non-essential goods during lockdown, but both businesses denied this.