NDTV’s online retail venture Indianroots targeted at Indian diaspora goes live, claims to deliver orders within 7-10 days

Media group NDTV’s retail venture targeted at Indian diaspora - Indianroots has gone live with its beta version. Presently the e-store offers designer collections, boutiques, home and living, accessories for men and women. Consumers around the world can purchase brands such as Fatfatiya, Falah, Kilol, Reme including several others.

Indianroots led by Rahul Narvekar, erstwhile co-founder of Fashionandyou, claims to ship the products globally with only plastic card based payment options. The website also charges extra shipping cost depending on volume. According to the website, it delivers orders within 7-10 days, however customized designer pieces would take anywhere between three weeks to two months.

“Currently we are doing around 80-100 orders sans any marketing effort, and average selling price (ASP) hovers around $250,” said one of the senior level employee on condition of anonymity.

Besides clothing, Indianroots offers accessories like bags, wraps, cushion covers, rugs and carpets including decorative stuffs like wall painting and handicrafts. NDTV group with $91 million revenue is leveraging hybrid model of inventory as well as marketplace.

With Indianroots NDTV eyes to tap $2 billion ethnic fashion market for non resident Indians based in US, Europe, South Africa, and Australian market. Over the past one year, the fledgling $10 billion ecommerce industry in India has been enticing corporates like Reliance, Tata and lately broadcasting conglomerate NDTV.

Indianroots will compete with players like Utsav Fashion, Cbazaar and Jabongworld, which offer wide range of fashion products from India to global audience. Earlier in 2011, Times Internet Limited (TIL) also forayed into this space with HutK, however later TIL had halted it probably owing to dismal traction.