Packaged foods company Britannia Industries Ltd has launched a WhatsApp-based store locator service that helps consumers locate grocery shops that stock the company’s brand of cookies and dairy items.
Given the ongoing lockdown, the GPS-based chatbot publishes a list of stores near the consumer’s current location, which have been recently serviced by the company, the maker of Tiger, and Good Day biscuits said in a statement. The technology solution has been built to swiftly respond to the surge in consumer demand, it added.
“Given the ongoing lockdown, our teams are constantly innovating to ensure high accessibility to our products, across geographies and town classes. The WhatsApp Chatbot is one such timely solution built to help consumers discover our products in their neighborhood,” said Varun Berry, managing director, Britannia Industries. “The high degree of familiarity that the Indian consumers have with WhatsApp makes it an ideal platform to reach a wide demographic of consumers.”
Britannia’s move is in line with several steps taken by fast moving consumer goods makers that are trying new associations, and technology interventions for last mile supply of goods. Over a month in to India’s lockdown, several large consumer goods makers have latched on to food aggregator platforms, and logistics companies to use their delivery fleet to deliver their brands.