Aditya Birla Group: Aditya Birla Group to Shut ecommerce site Abof.com
New Delhi: Aditya
Birla Group’s flagship ecommerce site Abof.com will close down its
operations by the year end, unable to compete against the heavy discounting
model of online rivals such as Flipkart and Amazon.
On
Thursday morning, Abof short for Aditya Birla Online Fashion held a
20-minute townhall meeting and informed its employees that December 31 would be
the last day of its operations, two people aware of the development told ET.
Santrupt Misra, HR director at Aditya Birla
Group, confirmed the group’s exit from online retail space. “Looking at how the
big and long term ecommerce businesses continue to struggle and are unlikely to
make money for some time, it did not seem logical to continue as if everything
is all right in the sector,” he said.Misra said all the 240 employees of
Abof will be given four and-a-half months’ salary as compensation, in case they
wish to quit the company.
This is the second
ecommerce venture closure for Aditya Birla that wound up Trendin.com last year
for the same reasons. Abof launched in October 2015. “November onwards they
will start closing down their stocks,” said one of the two sources cited earlier.The
other source said brand Skult, which was exclusively available on Abof, will be
absorbed by the group’s branded apparel division Madura Fashion &
Lifestyle.
Aditya Birla Group launched Abof saying the site
would not offer discounts and, instead, sell a more limited and fashionable
range of merchandise. In an interview in March, chief executive Prashant Gupta
had told ET that their “target consumer is not the guy who is looking for a
deal”.But more than a year later, about 70% of the products on the portal were
available on discount.
Source: Et.retail.com
Friday, 22 September 2017