Honda India Power Products forays into e-commerce

Honda India Power Products (HIPP), a Noida-headquartered listed company in the power equipment industry, Tuesday announced its foray into e-commerce channels with the launch of its website in a bid to further shorten the distance between its products and its customers.

The subsidiary of Japan’s Honda Motor Company is into manufacturing and marketing power products such as portable -generators, water pumps, tillers, and general-purpose engines. It also markets lawn mowers, brush cutters and long-tailed boat engines.

For its entry into e-commerce, the 37-year-old company will be incorporating a marketplace on its existing website instead of listing its products on other e-commerce platforms, according to the company’s Chairman-cum-Managing Director and President Takahiro Ueda. “This will help us in servicing our customers directly and it will also make it efficient for our customers,” Ueda told DH.

The company also wanted to eliminate the scope for imitation products across various e-commerce channels, said Gagan Pal, Vice-president, Sales and Marketing, HIPP.

While the company is targeting an online sale of just about 0.4 per cent of its overall sale units, Ueda said they are expecting it to grow rapidly in the coming years. “We have set a very conservative target of 1,000 units through the online channel in the first year,” he said.

The website will allow HIPP customers to select a product, make payment and choose their preferred dealer to meet their pre-delivery inspection, sale and servicing needs.

Asked about HIPP’s late entry into e-commerce, Pal said “the need to go online was long felt and, in fact, our president (Ueda) directed us to go online even before the pandemic.” However, the company’s movement was not limited during the pandemic, which kept them busy with sales and marketing, Pal added.

The e-commerce purchase option will be open to a limited product range: water pumps, generators, tillers, lawn mowers and brush cutters. Other products including marine engines and general-purpose engines, which have to be assembled along with other machinery, will not be available for online sale.