The demand for same-day delivery of books from Amazon India in top 20 cities has doubled in the last one year, according to Rajarshi Guin, director of books and toys at the e-commerce major.
The company is tapping into this rising demand by increasing the number of titles available for delivery on same day, Guin told FE.
Under this feature, the books may be delivered in anywhere between 3 hours and 24 hours. “We see that the customers are likely to buy something two times more when they have fast delivery available,” he said. “Our same-day delivery now reaches 2X more customers as compared to last year,” he added.
Guin also said that the demand for physical books has been rising in tier-2 cities faster than in metro cities. “Tier-2 cities are outpacing metros by more than 2x,” he said.
Amazon India sells more than 20 million titles. The top three categories of books by demand on the platform are education & learning, international bestsellers, and regional classics. These three categories account for 60-70% of the total book sales on the platform. Guin said the demand for books has been growing in double digits in the past couple of years. In terms of demand, the top three states are Maharashtra, Karnataka, and Uttar Pradesh, he added.
“We want to make sure that every book ever printed is available to customers,” he said, adding that the company wants to have the largest collection of books across India.
The company has tied up with National Book Trust on the World Book Day to empower the youth through literacy. It is also working with NCERT, where the body donated thousands of books to be distributed among the youth. Interestingly, when Amazon launched its first shopping website in India on June 5, 2013, it only sold books.