Pumpkart earning profits, says company

Chandigarh-based B2B e-commerce start-up Pumpkart is running a bootstrapped operation and has been continuously profitable for the past two years, thus bucking the trend of loss registrationby all e-commerce players, according to its founder K S Bhatia.

Currently, Pumpkart started as a B2Ce-commerce company selling pumps. But, with the learning curve, the company pivoted and attained profitability, he said on Sunday.

Since 2006, the face of Indian companies has changed with the advent of e-commerce in India. Amazon, Flipkart, Paytm, Zomato, and Ola and all the 21 Unicorns of India are in the e-commerce sector.

The continuous upgrade in technology such as 4G revolution has helped these companies grow exponentially as the internet penetration in India increased from 4 per cent in 2009 to 40 per cent in 2018.

As a result, the e-commerce sector has now grown from USD 3.9 billion in 2009 to USD 38.5 billion in 2019, the owner of Pumpkart said.

Whenasked about the key reasons for turning profits in an industry known to guzzle up money, Bhatia said, "Location has been the main reason. While almost all unicorns came up from Bengaluru or Gurgaon, surviving the initial years in these locations is tricky. The costs of living and hiring talent in these cities are high and the burn rate increases.

"With limited resources in hand, Pumpkart decided to station in Chandigarh where there is no dearth of talent and the cost of living is conservative. This gave Pumpkart an opportunity to experiment with its business model as the runway for it was now longer."
Bhatia added, "Key to the success of Pumpkart's business is its understanding of the intricate retailer market which is under an onslaught from online players. Pumpkart has more than 5,000 retailers onboard currently and is working with them by equipping them to compete with the discount e-commerce portals."