Meet RedMart, the latest (and greatest?) online mart in Singapore

All busy Singaporeans will be happy to know of yet another online store that brings household products right to one’s very doorsteps.

The latest addition to the local e-grocery scene, Redmart, caters to the modern need for efficiency and convenience as more people decide to allocate time away from basic housekeeping matters.

Though grocery e-shopping is not a new thing here in Singapore, the scene, pioneered by Cold Storage in 1997 (refer to this study done in 2000/2001 by ex-NUS student Tan Kok Leng), has been rather dormant in the past decade. Only in the previous year has the concept surged in popularity.

Which makes it a perfect time for sites like RedMart, which isn’t the only startup doing this, to enter the market. Another similar site, Household.sg, made its debut last year.

Comparing the two, they are somewhat on par. However, I find that RedMart, which was started in November 2011, has the slight edge against its competitor.

For one, Redmart offers a unique “My List” program, which operates like a standard grocery list.

Here’s how it works: The products you buy upon your first purchase from the e-store will be stored on the list in the site, tagged with information like the frequency of repurchase, for example, two weeks or one month.

You will then receive an email once it’s time to restock your items, which is as easy as clicking on a link which will bring you immediately to checkout.

Another feature that only Redmart possesses: the ability to select more than one category or brand of items on the left sidebar at the same time.

This means that you need not, for instance, click on Colgate, Pearlie White and Sensodyne individually, and browse through items of each brand on separate instances; you just need to select all three brands consecutively, and the database will display all items from those brands at the same time.

Interesting, but not quite useful? Wait till you see the “sort by price” feature. Items from the three brands are sorted from the least pricey to the most, allowing you to easily find out which product best suits your budget and needs. Not a bad way to shop intelligently, isn’t it?

Other features of the service that might attract customers include: Free delivery on orders above $75, same day delivery on orders placed before 10am, the ability for customers to pick their own two-hour window for delivery, RedDealz, which offers deep daily discounts and weekly deals, and a 15 percent discount for customers ordering items for the first time.

On the site itself, items are cleanly organized into instinctive categories, just as how products in a conventional supermarket are shelved into sections that appeal immediately to the grocery shopper.

Also, there is that all-convenient search function where you can just “heck all” and plug in a keyword and get a list of matches that may be relevant to you.

Of course, Household.sg has some of these elements too, but it falls short when it comes to providing innovative extras such as the “My List” program, which is really RedMart’s “secret recipe” to giving extra value to their customers.

Both stores, however, seem to have a limited product range both within specific brands and across item categories.

I could not, for instance, find my Aussie Dream Organic Rice Milk, which I can’t do without every morning, on either sites. Also, both do not offer any kind of fresh food like fruits, vegetables and fresh milk.

Compare that to Cold Storage’s online counterpart, which offers all kinds of fresh food, from meat and poultry, to seafood.

 

Here is where RedMart stands out once again: They have a feedback mechanism in place where customers can simply click on a link next to the Search bar to request items that are not being offered.

In response, Roger said that “it is logistically very, very complex to get (selling fresh produce) right and we won’t do anything unless we can do it well.” Ultimately, RedMart’s goal is to get customers what they order, so they only sell what they have in their warehouse.

This is in contrast to the approach where online supermarkets would source for items from their physical stores, only to find out that there’s no stock. So they either replace them with a similar one or refund the customer, after they have made the transaction.

“I may be old fashioned, but I’d rather receive what I ordered!”

For recent features on similar initiatives that deliver convenience to people, check out our articles on LobangClub and SingPet.

About the author

Thoroughly Singaporean, Justin Chua is kiasu and embraces – no, chope – all job roles associated with critiquing, writing and producing creative work: copywriter, screenwriter, editor, critic, playwright, designer…… Youthfully versatile, he is currently in the progress of setting up a freelance Creative business in Writing, Design and related right-brain fields. Catch him on Facebook if you can.

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