Ecommerce start-up Meesho taps India’s second cities

A decade ago, Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Barnwal quit their salaried careers and began a tour of family-run stores in the southern Indian city of Bengaluru, attempting to work out why the country’s legion of small shopkeepers did not sell their cheap clothes and goods online.

It was a challenge that would inspire the Delhi college friends to create Meesho — an online platform with the lofty aim to “democratise ecommerce” in India, according to Aatrey, who along with former Sony executive Barnwal hails from a middle-class family that rarely bought expensive, branded items online.

“Around us are people who are looking for affordability,” says 34-year-old Aatrey, who took the risky step after working for Indian cigarette and consumer goods major ITC and adtech company InMobi. “This is the majority of the market in India.”

Today, Meesho is one of India’s fastest-growing online retailers, selling unbranded household goods, fashion and furnishing to about 190mn users. Its focus on the large, thrifty populations of the country’s less affluent but still sizeable cities has put it on a route to a stock market listing and placed it 72nd on the FT’s High-Growth Companies Asia-Pacific ranking.