Zomato, Swiggy delivery workers’ December 31 strike pushes brands to stock up

With gig workers at quick commerce platforms and food delivery companies planning to go on strike on December 31, makers of packaged snacks, soft drinks, ice-cream, confectionery and other impulse goods including PepsiCo, Parle, Coca-Cola, Nestlé and Britannia are increasing stocks in kirana stores, supermarkets such as D’Mart and Modern Bazaar and modern trade stores. Over the last few years, New Year’s eve has marked a peak for deliveries, executives at the companies and retail channels said. Restaurant chains are looking to their own apps to fill in the gaps or have reached out to logistics and other on-demand delivery companies.

Delivery gig workers at platforms such as Zomato, Blinkit, Swiggy, Zepto and Amazon are striking over low pay, poor job security and risks to safety. The riders had also called a strike on Christmas, hitting deliveries.

“We are not taking any chances and frontloading additional stocks in neighbourhood shops, in and around well-populated housing societies and modern trade to ensure access to consumers, whatever the outcome of the riders’ strike on New Year’s,” said aleading bottling partner of beverage maker Coca-Cola. “The Christmas strike did create some disruptions but New Year’s is much, much bigger for sales.”

To be sure, platforms have sought to head off trouble by offering more sops and pushing better earning opportunities of up to Rs 10,000 over the period.

Zepto is said to be offering an additional Rs 25 per order. The strike called by the Indian Federation of App Based Transport Workers (IFAT) is backed by regional entities in Delhi-NCR, Maharashtra, Karnataka, West Bengal and Tamil Nadu. They say more than 100,000 delivery workers will go on strike or reduce deliveries significantly on New Year’s eve..

Eternal, Swiggy and Zepto did not respond to queries. For New Year’s eve 2024, the platforms had said orders on their apps broke all previous records.

“We are ensuring a lot more stocking in general trade and large supermarkets for categories that typically peak during New Year’s such as snacking and confectionery,” said Mayank Shah, vice president at cookies and confectionery maker Parle Products. “This is to ensure consumers have access to our products, in places where deliveries could be impacted.”

Manufacturers of daily essentials and grocery staples have been reporting high double-digit growth on instant delivery apps ahead of New Year’s eve.

Mass emails
Restaurant chains that have their own apps are letting customers know about the alternative to ordering platforms.

“We have stepped up focus on our own Wow Eats app and have been sending mass emails to customers to promote ordering-in on our app on New Year’s eve,” said Sagar Daryani, cofounder of quick service chain Wow! Momo. “While we hope and have got assurances from aggregator partners that disruptions will be minimal and the standoff will be resolved, we have alternative plans in place.”

Others are looking to carriers that won’t be affected by the strike, said Daryani, who’s also president of the National Restaurants Association of India (NRAI), which represents over 500,000 outlets.

“At an NRAI level, some of our restaurant members are partnering with Shadowfax and Rapido since their riders are not part of the planned strike,” he said.

He added that this is also an opportunity to bring dining in back to restaurants and many chains are running offers specific to this.

“There is a worry about the strike but customers have already been buying our products since the weekend across platforms like Zepto, Instamart and Flipkart Minutes,” said the founder of a direct-to-consumer (D2C) nuts and dry fruits brand.