KOLKATA: Gariahat hawkers have decided to take the online route in an effort to boost sales after ceding a large share of business to e-commerce, especially after Covid.
While a dedicated e-commerce app is financially out of reach as yet, the plan, for now, is to reach out to potential customers through YouTube videos, from which interested buyers can place orders via telephone to get goods couriered.
The Gariahat Indira Hawkers' Union, which oversees about three-quarters of Gariahat's 2,000-odd hawkers, has hired a professional agency to create videos featuring 100 hawking stalls, categorised by product type.
Debraj Ghosh, the union's general secretary, said they planned to release at least seven videos in December, covering apparel, bedsheets, curtains, handbags, purses, junk jewellery, crockery, shoes and mobile accessories.
Each video will showcase about a dozen stalls and include product details and contact numbers. Similar videos will be later shot to eventually cover all hawkers.
"Before 2020, the average daily turnover of a stall was around Rs 7,500. It's now Rs 2,500," Ghosh told TOI. "This is mainly because many who moved to online shopping during the pandemic continue to shop online."
'Unless we go online, it will be tough to survive' Gariahat Indira Hawkers' Union general secretary Debraj Ghosh said the online shopping shift had left hawkers in dire straits, with many unable to even recover costs.
"We realised that unless we go to the customers as well, it would be difficult to survive," he added.
Ghosh said they will "be delighted" if a university or the state developed a dedicated app for them. "But now, we are trying to reach out to customers with our limited resources and hope to get an encouraging response," he said.
Ajay De and Monoranjan Dhar, both of whom have stalls in Gariahat, welcomed the initiative. "We have backed the hawkers' union in taking measures to counter the online invasion. If we manage to sell our goods online, we can soon reclaim lost business," De said.
Dhar expressed interest in attending workshops organised by the union to make vendors get used to the mode of business. "I am often quizzed by customers as to when I would start online services, as some of my permanent customers have grown old and need goods to be delivered at doorsteps," he said.
Jadavpur resident Mousumi Mukherjee, a retired teacher who shops at Gariahat, said ordering from home would be a huge convenience. "I need to visit Gariahat every alternate week. It will be of great help if I could get my stuff without having to go there," she said.
Stay updated with the latest news on Times of India. Don't miss daily games like Crossword, Sudoku, and Mini Crossword.