With the emergence of quick commerce in India, consumers are now experiencing an evolved shopping convenience. This evolution and growth of the e-commerce industry has resulted in increased demand for delivery personnel across the country.
Industry reports estimate that the delivery workforce will be around 23.5 million by 2029-30. Aiming to strengthen its delivery workforce in tier II cities, Swiggy has partnered with apna, a job and professional networking platform, to create 10,000 hyperlocal opportunities in deeper Bharat for its quick commerce grocery service Instamart in 2023.
The post-pandemic Indian economy has been growing, primarily due to increasing demand from the burgeoning workforce. Delivery partners are one of the most in-demand roles among the new-age workforce. Therefore, quick commerce companies are aggressively hiring delivery personnel to meet the soaring demand from consumers. According to RedSeer, the quick commerce domain is anticipated to touch $5.5 billion by 2025, up from $0.3 billion in 2021. This rapid growth will increase the demand from enterprises to hire more delivery partners.
Acquiring talent from tier II and III cities has always been a daunting task for many organisations, owing to several challenges such as lack of orientation, industry knowledge, inadequate experience and ignorance about the current market scenario. This problem is particularly pronounced in India, where companies have long struggled to hire talent from smaller cities and towns.
However, apna has been assisting employers from SMBs to large enterprises across the country by finding the right talent, especially in tier II cities and beyond. The company has developed a strong network in these areas, making it easier for organisations to find the right talent. The recent partnership between apna and Swiggy is a testament to this.
In 2022, more than 1.5 million users from tier II, tier III cities and beyond applied for 3 million delivery roles on the platform, contributing almost 70 per cent of the new users' growth in the delivery segment.
"We are delighted to partner with Swiggy as it shares our mission of empowering people to attain financial independence and become self-sufficient. With opportunities for delivery partners emerging in deeper pockets of the country, we aim to bridge the demand-supply gap for Swiggy and generate more job opportunities in the coming months," said Nirmit Parikh, Founder and CEO (chief executive officer) of apna.
"Delivery partners are the backbone of Swiggy, and help us jointly serve millions of users across food, quick commerce and other services. Given Swiggy's presence across 500 cities for food delivery and over 25 cities for Instamart, we continue to focus on onboarding partners from tier 2 and 3 cities. The partnership with apna has helped in augmenting our delivery fleet to cater to the growing demand on Instamart in smaller cities. We’re glad that it is creating more income opportunities for delivery personnel and contributing to the growth of the economy," observed Kedar Gokhale, vice president-Operations at Swiggy.
