How India’s Dairy Giant Amul Evolved from a Dairy Revolution to a D2C Powerhouse with StoreHippo

Challenge: Transforming India’s Dairy Juggernaut Amul into a Hyperlocal D2C Disruptor

Amul has delighted generations of Indians with the yummilicious tastes of its mouth-watering products. By offering a wide variety of dairy products through its extensive retail network, Amul has reined the dairy landscape for decades. However, with the changing buyer behaviour and demand for multi-channel, digital-first shopping, Amul recognised the need to expand its online presence and offer its premium FMCG products directly to consumers nationwide.

Amul had been using legacy ecommerce software to build its online presence. However, its monolithic enterprise solution lacked the creative control, agility and flexibility to support Amul’s hyperlocal D2C expansion, vast supply chain, high order volumes and nationwide customer base.

Amul’s ambitious hyperlocal D2C Ecommerce transition needed a location-wise multi-store ecommerce solution that could handle unique product offerings, pricing and inventory management solutions for each sub-store. Amul also needed PIN code-specific substore mapping which would show unique inventory for each location and map the order with the right sellers' after order placement. 

Additionally, Amul required a high-speed, conversion-oriented and engaging website that offered a frictionless buyer experience and could accommodate its large customer base without performance lags. 

To ensure seamless operations across channels Amul also needed smooth integrations with its existing software, logistics partners and third-party service providers. With high-volume daily orders, Amul needed a streamlined fulfilment solution that could automate order assignment for multiple orders and help in optimising shipping by selecting the best fit logistics provider.

Customisation was another key requirement so the final set-up aligned with Amul’s voice and requirements. For this, Amul needed a flexible and agile enterprise ecommerce solution provider that could tailor solutions aligned with its unique business model and operational workflows.

Lastly, migrating painlessly from its custom-built website to a more agile, scalable and future-proof platform was essential to avoid disruptions in ongoing business operations. Amul team was looking for an advanced ecommerce platform that could translate their vision of building a unique D2C ecommerce business into a reality.

Solutions

Powering Amul’s Hyperlocal Expansion with StoreHippo’s Custom-Built Multi-store D2C Ecommerce Ecosystem

StoreHippo’s enterprise ecommerce platform offers a host of built-in solutions designed to meet all of Amul’s unique requirements seamlessly. From building a cutting-edge D2C sales channel to managing hyperlocal deliveries through a network of location-based sub-stores, StoreHippo provided the flexibility and scalability Amul needed.

StoreHippo’s decoupled headless ecommerce solutions, plug-and-play features and hasle-free migration solutions could easily address all of Amul’s needs. 

Here is what Amul was able to achieve with StoreHippo:

D2C Online Store

To sell a vast range of dairy products Amul needed a D2C ecommerce solution that could enable the brand to showcase its huge inventory and engage directly with end buyers. StoreHippo’s native D2C ecommerce solutions built a scalable, high-performance portal for Amul which had the provision of multiple sub-stores to offer Amul’s buyers a personalised and localised buying experience.

Immersive And Conversion- Oriented Store Design

To enhance user experience and drive conversions, Amul needed a D2C store that was an improvement over its existing setup. StoreHippo upgraded Amul’s store from AngularJS to the advanced Vue.js framework, unlocking significant performance and user experience improvements. By shifting to Vue.js Amul store ensured faster page load speeds, enhanced graphics and UI, reduced bounce rates and offered a seamless shopping journey for its buyers. With a smoother, faster and more immersive browsing experience, Amul was able to achieve better overall conversions across sub-stores.

Location-Based Sub-Stores

To reach pan-India markets and keep adding new locations to its serviceable areas, Amul leveraged StoreHippo’s proprietary Multistore® ecommerce solutions and built a network of 40+ location-based sub-stores. Each store showcased unique inventory, pricing, offers etc based on customer geolocation and also has its unique vendors’ list.

Central Dashboard

To manage such a vast network of 40+ sub-stores ( and growing) Amul required a central control with visibility of stocks, order flows and operations across the multi-store network. With StoreHippo’s central dashboard feature for managing multiple sub-stores Amul admin teams and management got a comprehensive view of all vendor activities, orders and shipping across all its sub-stores.

Extensive Customisations and Scalability

Amul’s extensive business needed a scalable and extensible enterprise ecommerce platform that could be tweaked inside out at the front end as well as the backend to build tailored solutions for the legacy brand. From building a wow storefront to designing unique workflows and fulfilment solutions for hyperlocal deliveries, Amul needed an agile ecommerce platform that could scale seamlessly with the brand’s growth. 

StoreHippo’s MACH ( Microservices, API-first, Cloud-native, Headless) architecture, inherent scalability and flexibility took care of all the customisation and scalability requirements of Amul. With multi level customisations at the front end and backend taken care of, Amul got a tailored D2C store with a network of sub-stores to meet its business goals. The multiple customisations on Amul store not only enhanced buyer experience but also improved operational efficiency and reduced errors by automating manual processes.

Automated Nearest Branch Selection And Inventory Sync

Managing inventory across Amul’s vast distribution network was a challenge. To make Amul’s order fulfillment smarter and faster StoreHippo offered an AI-driven inventory system that automatically assigned orders to the nearest seller from the buyer’s location thus optimizing delivery times and stock management. This system is also designed to allot the order to next nearest seller if the stock is unavailable with the nearest seller. In case of no local stock, the system checks stock at the Ahmedabad branch before marking the item as sold out.

With this automated fulfilment process, Amul has significantly reduced cancellations, improved inventory turnover, accelerated order fulfilment, and enhanced customer satisfaction with faster, more reliable deliveries.

One-Click Fulfillment

Amul was expecting thousands of online orders daily and to manage these orders effortlessly they needed a simplified and automated fulfilment solution that could save manual time and limit errors. StoreHippo designed a One-Click Fulfillment solution to streamline Amul’s order processing, automating everything from order assignment and invoice generation to PIN code serviceability checks, smart logistics selection, and error handling for non-serviceable areas.

By eliminating manual effort in streamlining fulfilment, Amul achieved faster order processing, higher logistics accuracy, reduced errors and improved overall efficiency. 

Seamless Integrations

To ensure a frictionless shopping experience on its D2C online store, Amul needed seamless integrations with trusted payment service providers that ensured smooth, secure and frictionless checkouts for its buyers. With diverse payment preferences across its vast customer base, Amul required a multi-choice payment solution to facilitate hassle-free conversions.

StoreHippo’s pre-integrated payment gateway solutions enabled Amul to integrate its preferred payment service providers ensuring a secure and convenient checkout process. By integrating multiple payment options, Amul was able to enhance buyer trust, reduce cart abandonment and improve overall conversions across its D2C ecommerce store.

Hassle-Free Migration From Legacy Software

Amul began its digital foray through its custom ecommerce software. However, the rigid monolithic structure became a bottleneck in achieving many of Amul’s growth and operational objectives. To scale without limitations and do away with the inefficiencies of Amul’s existing software, StoreHippo offered future-ready solutions and orchestrated seamless migration from their existing platform. StoreHippo enterprise ecommerce solutions aligned effortlessly with Amul’s unique growth requirements and helped the legacy brand chart an impressive growth trajectory resulting in 12X growth in online orders.

Delivering Amul Goodness Pan India- A Journey From 10 To 15000+ PIN Codes

With StoreHippo powering its multi-store hyperlocal D2C setup, Amul was able to build a tailored ecommerce ecosystem with unmatched scalability, seamless automation and agile customizations, ensuring a future-proof and high-performance digital expansion.

StoreHippo successfully met Amul’s requirements with a well-rounded, next-gen ecommerce platform that helped Amul create a strong hyperlocal presence across 1500+ PIN codes in a short duration of 18 months. Along with this Amul was able to make its processes automated and efficient and that combined with an immersive buyer experience resulted in better buyer engagement and loyalty for Amul’s digital sales channel.  

Amul, India’s most loved brand, is now making strides in the hyperlocal ecommerce space, redefining digital retail. StoreHippo is proud to support Amul’s journey, providing the next-gen technology to power its seamless D2C Ecommerce expansion.