Saying No to Jugaad : The making of BigBasket
Paul Graham of Y-Combinator, has said this multiple times. “Make a product that a small set of people really love, rather than a product which a lot of people sort of like.”
BigBasket has been one of those companies who have become absolutely essential to their customers. BigBasket is loved by now a lot of people. One of my friend likes to joke, “BigBasket ne bohot shaadiya bachayi hai.” (BigBasket has saved a lot of marriages.). They deliver grocery to you early in the morning. And they do this one thing so well, that I have stopped my weekly/ad-hoc trips to grocery market. And I am slowly ordering more and more items from BigBasket instead of other sources. And for busy couples short on time to go for grocery purchase, this is a blessing. So, I have been curious about BigBasket for some time.
And then this book released two weeks back. I had to read it to understand the people, processes, values and ideas that have shaped and made BigBasket. The book is a delight to read. Each chapter takes one of the dimensions of BigBasket as an organisation, and then talks about details. One thing that stood out throughout the book was the no-nonsense/grounded way of looking at the world. Founders and team members, as they are quoted through the book, reflect a perspective that has been honed by keeping at their work without getting swayed by fads and hype-cycles. They are very clear that BigBasket is a retail company with customer experience at its centre. This is important. It helps them look at everything else as an enabler to this core goal. They don’t spend a lot of time defining whether they are a mobile-first, or AI-first, or tech-first company. Tech is an enabler to optimise supply chain. Tech is an enabler to resolve customer complaints fast. Mobile app is a channel, just like website where customers discover and interact with BigBasket. Rather, they have spent time and effort in building out their inventory control, supply chain, logistics, supplier/farmers tie-ups, buying and merchandising, customer experience. Apart from that, the book goes into organisation building. You need to be process-obsessed and institutionalise quality control in your processes. You need create comprehensive training regime to train everyone from frontline staff to executive team. To add capabilities, you can either build in-house or buy or license from a technology partner. There are chapters on each of the topic, which are enjoyable and enlightening.
The authors have done a commendable work of telling a well-balanced and well-rounded story of BigBasket, as it went from a company present in Bangalore to a company serving 1 crore users and clocking revenues of $500 million a year. Read this book if you want to peek into BigBasket world and get a sense of how they do what they do. The authors make clear that they are under no impression that they’d disclose some IP of BigBasket by writing about how it works.
“If anyone believes that one could imitate and get ahead by reading about what others have done, they must be kidding themselves.”.
It actually makes sense, and that’s what makes this book even more special. It doesn’t shy away from telling real stories about how a group of people are revolutionising the way we order grocery.
