The entrepreneurs and artisans from one of the world’s largest slums, Dharavi (pop. 1 M) located in the heart of India’s financial capital, Mumbai, have made a formal entry into India’s thriving e-commerce market. Over 200 small and medium entrepreneurs from the bustling slum are now on Snapdeal, one of the country's large online retail marketplaces. The exclusive Dharavi Snapdeal store will sell luggage, shoes, accessories, pottery, apparel and jewelry made in the slum.
Taking the first steps into the global e-commerce market is a significant milestone for hundreds of industrious artisans who thrive in the teeming, squalor-ridden maze of Dharavi. In that densely-populated area which many equate to a ‘special economic zone’, families live and work out of tiny 80 sq ft home-cum-workshops. Most entrepreneurs are illiterate and have no idea about e-commerce, though the slum’s annual revenues are estimated to run into billions of dollars. Until now, most of their products were traded in the slum or in the wholesale markets nearby . “They live, make and sell – all in Dharavi, and every home produces something,” said Megha Gupta, an urban researcher who aggregated the entrepreneurs through her Dharavimarket.com which in turn has tied up with Snapddeal. Many craftsmen did not even have photos of their products to showcase on the e-commerce site and provided photos clicked on their smartphones.
Snapdeal said Dharavi has at least 500 apparel makers, each making 500 shirts a day. It also has 1,000 families of potters whose earthen lamps light up Mumbai city during Diwali, the Indian festival of lights, and whose ornate pots are exported to Europe and North America.
The artisans who have jumped onto the e-commerce marketplace through Snapdeal include the large family of Hussain Sheikh who make leather jackets and bags as well as the family of Dharmesh Maru, fourth generation potters whose eco-friendly terracotta plates, glasses and teapots are much in demand.
Buyers will snap up Dharavi's products not because they are made in a slum but because of they are... [+]
