Zomato scraps grocery delivery for the 2nd time in 2 years

Famous online food delivery platform, Zomato has shut down its grocery delivery services for the second time in a row. It had stated its 45-minute grocery delivery service in some market regions, starting from Delhi NCR, in July 2021. It was a marketplace model, where users could directly deliver from stores. The pilot ends on September 17 with no plans to run any other form of grocery delivery in future.

The grocery delivery model of Zomato did not see much success for the second time. There were quite a few challenges, including frequent changes in the inventory and gaps in order fulfilment leading to a poor customer experience.

After having scrapping the grocery delivery service once, Zomato had re-entered the same space this year amid steep competition from incumbents like Swiggy’s Instamart, Grofers, Reliance Industries-owned JioMart, and Tata group’s, BigBasket besides hyperlocal delivery platforms such as Google-backed Dunzo.
The first time when Zomato had forayed into the grocery delivery space was the time of countrywide lockdown in 2020.