Meesho is one of the leading E-commerce reselling apps that support and encourage women to be entrepreneurs.
Highlights
- Meesho is one of the most progressing apps that help women to start their own online shop.
- This is a successful startup by Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal.
- It was created in 2015.
- It is a revolutionary platform which helps women to understand their entrepreneur skills.
Meesho is one of the most famous and grossing startup in the current time. Meesho has gained a lot of fame in the last 2 years.
It is best known for delivering good quality products at a very reasonable price. But this is just one quality of this platform. There are many more qualities of this platform. This app helps women to be free and independent. It also encourages women to be entrepreneurs.
The app was craved a place for it in the reselling commerce industry. It also gained great popularity between their retailers and customers by making selling and shopping affordable and hassle-free.
They provide secure and on-time transactions as well as low cost returns and shipping. There are more than 2.6 million resellers that trust Meesho across India. They intend to create an environment where you don’t have to worry about investment to establish a business.
Meesho also boasts about having more than 20,000 Meesho suppliers from more than 500 towns across India, apart from their resellers. They also work on a commission of almost 10- 15%. Initial sellers can also earn by putting a gross margin to every transaction.
History of the startup
When Meesho started in 2015, it was initially named as FASHNEAR. The plan behind FASHNEAR was like Swiggy or Zomato today.
It dealt with fashion goods and customers were allowed to buy fashion accessories and clothes from the shops in their near proximity.
The local apparel and accessories selling shops could sign up with the FASHNEAR. Customers could order from these shops and delivery was done by delivery guys.
But soon the creators noticed a few flaws in the business model of the app. The few drawbacks were that the buyers were not worried about buying clothes from the shops in their proximity.
The sellers also wanted to sell their products in other parts of the country rather than locally as this can increase their sales. These issues caused FASHNEAR to fail.
These problems inspired the creators Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal to work on a more efficient model. Thus FASHNEAR was redesigned and redefined as ‘Meesho’.
The creators wanted to know more about the issues of shopkeepers and resellers. Thus, they visited many shopkeepers and the resellers.
They noticed that the sellers would sell their goods through Whatsapp, but the only con of this was the reach was only local. They further understood that the most shops registered in the platform were women’s. These women sold their goods from their homes.
The current business model is built on all these considerations. Women can now start business without owning any inventory.
They empower small shops and manufacturers. Meesho takes care of the delivery of the goods and facilitates COD options as well as ensures the customers a hassle-free return. Meesho works as a bridge between manufacturers, resellers and buyers.
Meesho- Founders
Meesho was created by Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal.
Vidit Aatrey worked with Inmobi, a mobile marketing platform where he drafted strategies for the company’s growth. He also worked in ITC Limited in the part of business Operation.
Sanjeev Barnwal, before he co-founded Meesho, worked as developer and Camera Hardware Abstraction Layer Architecture Designer. He studied and graduated from IIT Delhi with a Bachelor degree in engineering. He has worked in Sony corporation prior to this.
Both the founders were batch mates in 2008-2012. They sought out a plan to assemble a stage to help Micro. Little and Medium Enterprises(MSMEs).
They is currently working with an employee strength of 750+ in their team.
Meesho- Their business model
Meesho does not essentially work on a D2C business model. In this model, a product is sold to the consumers by the manufacturer directly. But they have resellers.
These resellers were middlemen between manufacturer and customer. It is a platform that helps businesses to increase their reach, sales and profits. They in turn charge certain fees and commission. This was later changed into a B2B business model in 2021.
The major source of revenue for this platform are the commission charges Meesho receives from its vendors. Another portion of revenue is from advertisements and data.
They don’t break any privacy policies and the policies do not allow them to sell data that can breach the privacy of their clients.
The company’s main aim is to help more than 100 million small businesses flourish in the digital world. Their mission statement says, “Democratize internet commerce for everyone.”
Meesho basically means ‘Meri Shop’ or ‘Apni Dukaan’ in Hindi which justifies their services. It further aspires to create an environment where anyone can establish a business without a worry of financial investment.
Their tagline says, ‘ Not just a homemaker, a Meesho entrepreneur.’
Meesho- Funds & Investments
Meesho has raised a total of $1.1 billion over the course of 11 rounds of financing. The most recent capital came through a debt financing round from Trifecta Capital Advisors on October 20, 2021.
According to sources close to the company and matter, Meesho is looking forward to an IPO in early 2024.
They are also planning to ready its listing by the end of this year and both India and US market for its public listing area also there in the list. Meesho has also invested $8 million in a top social commerce platform of Latin America called Elenas.
During their seasonal sale event called Maha Indian Shopping League from 6-9 October 2021, Meesho, saw an increase in users of 750% over the previous year. 60% of total demand of Tier-4+ market are from regions like Khawzawl in Mizoram and Sopore in Jammu and Kashmir. During this sale, consumers saved around 60 Crores in discounts.
The firm had a strong success in the fashion segment. Compared to last year, the demand for women’s clothing and accessories increased by 623% and orders for men’s apparel increased by 640%.
Meesho recently became the latest startup to join the acclaimed Unicorn club in April 2021.
The addition happen after getting $300 million in a new investment round head by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, estimating the company at $2.1 billion. The last value of Meesho stood at $5 billion in March 2022.
