When Manoj Kumar made ‘Roti, Kapda aur Makaan’ (1974), little did he imagine that 40 years down the line his idea of bare necessities of life would undergo such a transformation (by the way, the something similar to the movie name was used as the election catchphrase during the general elections in Pakistan then). Today those necessities have changed forms completely i.e. Roti (junk food), Kapda (branded clothes where the hefty premium that we pay for quality is mostly not justified), makaan (better and bigger dwelling place). Though there still remains a certain section of the society for which the basic needs remain same as ever namely: Roti, Kapda and Makaan. However for the rest of India, the growing middle class or whatever you want to call it, these very necessities have changed dramatically. The change is not restricted to the needs alone, more interesting is the manner in which we are going about achieving or satisfying our ‘basic’ need (read greed). What Benjamin Franklin said years back is more relevant today than any time in the history of mankind: he said ‘time is money’. Going by the same adage, the transition is quite understandable and justified. The saying signifies two of the most important resources at our disposal. We need to utilize them in the best possible manner to satisfy our greed, oops sorry need! So time plus money equals food, clothes and shelter. One factor that has made this entire process faster, easier and more comfortable is the growth of e-commerce. You are hungry? Why go to a restaurant, subject yourself to mad traffic, long queues? Order online. Need clothes? Why travel to a nearby mall and wait in queues, which refuse to end, to pay your bills? In case you know what you want, just place an order online (not many do that but writing is on the wall). Presently, we are at a stage where most of us are brand conscious but open to consider various brands (depending on where we are getting a good deal!), but there will come a time when we will graduate to the next stage: where we would be clear as to which brand we want to buy and that is when buying clothes online will reach a different scale. Latest trend is buying properties online. Few companies have tested the model and surprisingly they were relatively successful. Though it is a farfetched idea but the days are not far when more and more people would start exercising this option (regulator for the industry would help the cause). Coming back to the resources/needs equation, you would notice that e-commerce not only saves time but also ends us saving money as things bought online generally come cheap vis-à-vis regular modes, for obvious reasons. It was only a few years ago that we had heard about the advent of modern retail in India with malls coming up at every possible place, at times next to each other! And now we see even good malls seeing vacancy levels of almost 20-25%. Personally I have seen myself graduate from buying books outside Churchgate station (for years) to buying at organized retail outlets (for sometime) to ordering online (for times to come, I guess). This list of roti, kapda, makaan is not exhaustive as host of other products and services are being sold online. Forgot about buying online, people have started selling online and how! A scary thought: just imagine the chaos if suddenly everyone stopped buying/selling online! We would encounter never ending queues and pay more for goods and services. Bonus: A pizza delivery chain in Mumbai recently delivered a pizza via drone! As they say ‘change is the only constant’ and with the emergence of O2O (online 2 offline), the times ahead are exciting to say the least. Our generation will be a witness to this fascinating process where people would go from standing (in)line to buying (on)line!
