In an interaction with Mobility Magazine, Mr Vibhooti Prasad, Director, O-Line-O, shares their company’s business-concept, strategy and expansion plans. O-Line-O Nexus Pvt Ltd, based out of Mumbai, is an offline-to-online business bridge between brands, retailers and the end customers. The company helps the consumers purchase products from the offline stores without physically visiting the stores, enjoying the convenience of shopping from home.
Mr Vibhooti Prasad shares, “Within 3 years after we started, we saw phenomenal growth in our business and operations–in terms of volumes as well as reach. In 2019-20, we grew very well, but in 2020-21, due to the pandemic, our growth was less, but still on the positive side. Current challenges include a shortage of product components such as processors because of which products are in short supply across the industry. However, the situation is expected to get normal by early 2022. Overall, this financial year (2021-22) our operations and business have picked up momentum and we expect it to improve further in the coming months. We have kicked off our flagship campaign, ‘Indian Festival Days – IFD’ with great momentum. As of my current knowledge, we are the only retail chain with 5% Cashback from SBI. Apart from this, our customers will get the chance to participate in Scratch and Win on every smartphone purchase. They will win from a collection of audio products from Riversong and Play. That’s not it! Each participant will also stand a chance to win in our bumper lucky draw. We will hold the bumper lucky draw on 25th December. The grand bumper draw prize will be a Royal Enfield Bullet. Winners will also take home class-leading products from Realme such as their newly launched Realme Book laptop. Apart from this, our customers can also avail discounts of up to Rupees 10,000 in our referral cum loyalty program. ”
O-Line-O has cleverly utilizes its presence on the ground to provide a unique advantage compared to online e-commerce portals. When the O-Line-O partners’ store staff delivers the products, they also help customers with phone start-up, deliver the products within a very competitive time of 4 hours and provide customers with options of purchasing accessories on their doorstep. Customers particularly appreciate the support from the store staff to help them complete the migration of data and give tricks to operate the products. O-Line-O blends the online shopping experience with an extended offline service provided by friendly neighborhood expert to help the customers. Along with this customer-friendly approach, customers can avail all types of finance schemes and offers such as no-cost EMIs, Zero Downpayment schemes among many more offers.
“To motivate and drive the growth of our retail partners, we are organizing regular training sessions. Alongside, we also guide them to make best use of digitalization wherever possible to improve their bottom-line. We are also providing excellent promotion support to our partners through in-store branding such as banners, posters, special marketing campaigns, etc. This helps increase the footfall at our partners’ stores, which will eventually lead to more business. We have a very customer-friendly website through which customers can place their orders and get them fulfilled. Currently, we are dealing with the leading brands like Realme, Vivo, Oppo, Apple, Samsung, Mi, OnePlus etc. We tied up with Realme recently, in May 2021,” mentions Mr Vibhooti Prasad.
O-Line-O supplies only original products (no secondhand or refurbished products), which are delivered to the customers through the chosen neighborhood O-Line-O partner. The company ensures hassle-free services—repairs, replacements, easy loans, instant exchange, etc to the customers. Today, O-Line-O has emerged as the most reliable and fast-growing mobile retail chain in Mumbai and Nasik with a mission to revitalize the retail space by bringing services that the customers’ desire with the combined benefits of offline and online functionalities; and the company is now expanding to cities outside Mumbai.
Regarding their future plans, Mr Vibhooti Prasad shares, “We are expanding our geographical reach rapidly; right now we have 68 retail partners in Mumbai and 15 partners in Nasik. We have tied up with 18 new retail partners in Bangalore, who will start operating with effect from Oct 14. In 2022, we want to expand into new territories including MP, West Bengal, Delhi, Rajasthan, Bihar, etc. We are upbeat about the response we are getting and sure that the business will pick up considerably during this festive season and in 2022.”
