Kochi startup to create 2,000 jobs during Covid

KOCHI

: DiagunCart.com, a Kochi-based e-commercial platform that was started during the first wave of the Covid pandemic is targeting to create 2,000 job opportunities and a monthly turnover of Rs 10 crore in the near future as part of its expansion plans. The startup is promoted by Jiji Philip, Abhilash Vijayan, and Habeeb Rahman.


“Initially we will be expanding across south India and the work will start within two months’ time,” said Jiji Philip, the CEO of DiagunCart.com. “Currently we use Speed Post and courier services to service our customers, but with the expansion, we will be setting up our own network for delivering products. We are expecting to add 2000 people by the time we expand,” he added.

According to Philip, it was the high prices of masks and other Covid-19 products in the Kerala market that prompted them to set up a business, quickly.

“When the lockdown started, the price levels of masks and sanitizers were high – the medical shops were selling masks for Rs 25 per piece and I still keep with me a 100 ml bottle of sanitizer which cost me Rs 160, a year ago. We decided to source products directly from places like Delhi and sell it cheap here. Hence, we used an open-source platform to set up portal within three days’ time, and kept on adding Covid-related products,” he said.

The Covid-safety kit and later the Onam kit of groceries were quite successful in the market. And the low prices of Covid products attracted Etihad, Emirates and at some point Air India too to DiagunCart.com. “We still supply nationally to Etihad and Emirates, because our prices are very competitive,” Philip said.

Over the last one-year period, the portal has created a customer base of 50,000 people and a turnover of Rs 10 crore.

DiagunCart.com has gone on increasing the variety of product it sells through its platform - industry safety products, personal safety products, disinfectants and biodegradable, agriculture and compostable products, sports and beauty care and other consumer products are sold through it.