Bajar- Shopping Online with the Local Retailers is now a Reality!

With the advent of online shopping and e-commerce portals, the local shopkeepers have taken a hit. We know this for a fact that the brick and mortar stores are bearing loses in today's digitized world. To combat this problem, Mr. Yashraj Bhatia came up with the idea of shopping online but with local retailers.

Think about it. When we are shopping online, how often do we come across a local seller from the nearby spaces? Rarely! Hence with Yashraj's brilliant idea and his startup Bajar, which is a mobile application, he has strived to create a platform for retailers in the offline markets, giving them the ability to showcase their products to the online markets.

Bajar Highlights

About Bajar and How it Works
Bajar - USP
Bajar - Founder and team
How was Bajar Started
Bajar - Name, Tagline and Logo
Bajar - User Acquisition
Bajar - Business Model and Revenue Model
Bajar - Startup Challenges
Bajar - Competitors
Bajar - Growth
Bajar - Future Plans

About Bajar and How it Works

Founded in 2019, Bajar is a platform for retailers in the offline markets giving them the required platform to showcase their products to the online markets. The sole motive behind this application is to create a platform where the customer is purchasing online, with all its benefits and comforts. But instead of purchasing from an e-commerce website, the consumers buy from their nearest local retailer. The application is a purely retailer-centric platform.

The application doles out to be a 'Virtual Store' for retailers who are given the ability and space to display their products online as they do in their stores physically. The idea is to create a platform where the consumers get to purchase online with all its comfort and convenience, but instead of an e-commerce portal, they buy from their nearest local retailer. Bajar wants to create a retailer-centric market rather than a product-centric environment which is the case in usual market places.

Bajar - USP

This startup rides on the vision to support local businesses and customers. The creative idea of this startup is to create a selling platform that would give power to the retailers and each locality would have its market catering to the residents. The unique selling proposition of Bajar is in being the vendor concerned platform rather than a platform that is flooded with a plethora of products.

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Bajar - Founder and team

Yashraj Bhatia is the founder and CEO of this innovative startup, Bajar. He graduated from Sri Guru Gobind Singh College of Commerce, University of Delhi and is also an alumnus of Springdales School.

How was Bajar Started

The idea that gave birth to Bajar came to Yashraj during a mall visit.  He was there to do some light shopping but he felt ill-equipped to know what the shops are selling. This got him thinking about how the markets and retailers are so unorganized. There is no go-to app that lets the buyers know which shops are selling what.

If one stands in the market today, he is bound to run after references and struggle for information regarding a reliable vendor for simple needs. Consumers keep asking questions like  "Hey, where can I buy furniture?" "Do you know someone who sells Laptops?", "Is this retailer any good?" to their friends and family.

So Yashraj felt like doing something about this situation. He was more inclined to create a platform for retailers, rather than becoming an e-commerce platform. For him, an expansion into a selling platform would give power to the retailers and each locality would have its market catering to the residents. He realized that the current eCommerce websites concentrate more on the products rather than the vendors. He aspired to change the situation by identifying a feasible solution.  And this is how Bajar was conceived.

This was back in January 2019,  when he sketched out the whole app and the screens on his iPad and began scouting for developers to turn this into a fruitful reality. His interest in technology and development guided him to shape his ideas to a fully functional application.  He was fascinated by the advancements in the sectors and yearned to utilize it for the upliftment of the community. He identified the right resources to develop a user-friendly and reliable mobile application. The application went live on 1st August 2019, and since then it has listed 4000+ retailers from major markets of Delhi.

Bajar - Name, Tagline and Logo

"The name was something I did a lot of thinking about." says this young entrepreneur.  Yashraj wanted it to be relatable yet unique, at the same time, he wanted the name to be something that is easy to share. He also felt that the brand name should also be able to conveniently express what the application does. "Bajar" felt like something relatable.

He leaned for a Hindi name particularly because it gives the vibe of the country. After finalizing the name, it was just a matter of time before the logo was ready that took the brand name forward with the bag behind it which easily signified shopping.

Bajar - User Acquisition

The initial bunch of customers for Bajar were Yashraj's family and friends. As the application started to list retailers, they became the initial batch of users for the application. As Bajar moved forward, the initial traction they received was from simple social media posts. And it was simply amazing. As they explained what the application does on their social handles, the number of users kept multiplying.

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Bajar - Business Model and Revenue Model

Bajar extracts its primary revenue from retailers for "On-boarding". This is just a fancy term used for defining a retailer who is using the 'Retailer' app to manage their profile. Once on-board, the retailer is entitled to add products and offers and reply to ratings and reviews, with a simple, easy-to-use app, designed especially for them. Other revenue sources include advertisement sales and featuring offers and retailers on the application.

Once sale/purchase is conducted on the platform, they charge a minor convenience fee depending upon the size of the transaction.

Bajar - Startup Challenges

The biggest hurdle for Bajar was to explain this new and advanced concept of shopping to retailers as well as end-users. People, in general, take a lot of effort and persistence to adopt something new and move out of their comfort zone. Even if the new and updated things bring more convenience and comfort, the big cloud of being in the comfort zone always hangs above everyone's mind.

Bajar - Competitors

Bajar as such has no direct competition as of now. In the listing sphere, there are many shops listed on Google and Justdial, but none of them cover all of the markets like Bajar does or allow the retailers to list their products.

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Bajar - Growth

Retailer Markets are so widespread and in such huge quantities that there is massive scope to grow not just in NCR but pan-India. Also, the consumers have well received his idea for a retailer-oriented application.  Hence this increases the chances of successfully penetrating in the Indian market.

Bajar - Future Plans

The future plan for Bajar is to expand the application to pan India. The founder's vision is to target the small retail market among metropolitan cities such as Bangalore, Mumbai, and Hyderabad.

Bajar, as a mobile application is not about being a regular shopping experience. It's solving a bigger problem in the economy. We in this age of digitization need to take everyone up the ladder with us. Hence this idea of empowering the local retailers with digitization is remarkable.