In this five-part series, Damodar Mall, CEO of Reliance Retail, talks about how he had to battle the challenges thrown up by the pandemic and lockdown, to keep his employees as well as his customers safe. And how his team drew on customer behaviour insights to adapt their game to emerging needs.

Part 1: Creating a safety bubble and reducing anxiety
Mall talks about the immediate measures they took in the first four days to reduce anxiety for employees as well as customers. The company mobilised a daily symptom declaration program for all employees and their families, and they set up hygiene rhythms in stores. Meanwhile, distribution pipelines had shrunk. So they focused on ensuring supply of 50 essential items, to give customers a sense of abundance in the store. The brands and vendors responded too, as they realised this was the shortest route to the customer.

Part 2: We took the store associates along with us
Mall talks about how they were able to inspire employees during this difficult time. “If people are treated like labour, response rates are lower,” he says. Cluster managers made sure to talk to the family of every associate and regional heads visited stores to connect. 
There was considerable community goodwill too, with customers bringing home-cooked food and volunteering in the stores. These stories kept people going too.

Part 3: We morphed to become the provider of small joys of life
As the lockdown continued, they realised that people are bored at home and anxious. So Reliance Retail shifted focus slightly to also include comfort foods. “Supermarket items become the surrogate for comforting communication, as other stimuli of wellbeing—going out, spending time with friends and family—are switched off,” Mall says.

Part 4: Continuous innovation and reimagining deliveries to home
In this segment of the conversation, Mall talks about how they are constantly innovating to improve customer convenience. “If we can try five things, we are trying seven,” he says. “The biggest service I am providing is availability and fair pricing,” he adds. 
They ramped up to 70,000 home deliveries a day in the larger cities, within four-five days. On their deliver-to-home play, Mall says, home delivery is becoming mainstream, “and this time we will lead it.” That’s because for brands to go hyperlocal, they'll have to set up the supermarket backend—because customer does not shop for brands, but shops by categories.

Part 5: When food became a playground for creativity and bonding
Here Mall talks about how they are emerging as a source of consumer and market intelligence for FMCG brands—because everybody's dashboard is broken. And their data shows that Indian supermarket customers are behaving quite differently from other countries. “As people became less anxious, they turned into regular customers, demanding their regular stuff. By the time we went into the fifth week, customers were asking for rolled oats, gluten-free bread, and multigrain aata. Food became a playground for creativity, bonding and showing off on social media.” Instead of pantry-loading, there’s a natural “premiumisation” that’s taking place, he says.

(Part 5) Retail Reset - Lockdown lessons from Reliance Retail

(Part 4) Retail Reset - Lockdown lessons from Reliance Retail

(Part 3) Retail Reset - Lockdown lessons from Reliance Retail

(Part 2) Retail Reset - Lockdown lessons from Reliance Retail

(Part 1) Retail Reset - Lockdown lessons from Reliance Retail

Designing for 100 million users is different from designing for 100 users and scaling it up for 100 million, says Shankar Maruwada, co-founder of EkStep Foundation, an educational platform for school students.

In the conversation with Founding Fuel, in our podcast series Virtuoso, Shankar traces the journey of EkStep and distills some of the key lessons for entrepreneurs and builders. Here are five takeaways from the conversation:

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