According to sources familiar with the company, about 80% of Meesho’s users and 65% of transacting users are from its direct selling business.
Now, it is looking to capture a larger wallet share by going after “affordable brands” in categories like beauty and electronics, sources aware of the matter said.
The category is being called Meesho Brands and the company has already started hiring people for the business through professional networking site LinkedIn to identify brand partners to scale the business.
The SoftBank-backed startup had largely stuck to selling longtail unbranded categories like apparel, jewellery, footwear and electronics. ET reported last year that the platform, which had been largely dependent on women resellers, would sell to customers directly.
Meesho’s attempt to sell branded goods comes at a time when it is trying to take on bigger rivals like Flipkart and Amazon India.
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Potential affordable brands can be electronics company Boat, or footwear firm Relaxo, where there is a degree of customer awareness and trust, according to people aware of Meesho’s thinking.
A spokesperson of Meesho declined to comment. Boat and Relaxo did not respond to emails.
A job posting on LinkedIn showed that the role requires identifying “potential brand partnerships and onboard these brands as users on the platform.”
The Bengaluru-based company has also started work on rebranding its logo and moving away from pink to appeal to male users, sources aware of Meesho’s plans told ET.
This is also an attempt to attract men to Meesho, which has been known for women’s apparel till now, people briefed on the matter said.
A source aware of the matter said that the company had already benchmarked certain colours.
“They are unlikely to go with blue, yellow, orange, or green since it is already associated with other companies like Flipkart, Amazon, Swiggy and Dunzo,” the source said.
Meanwhile, the Meta-backed firm said last week that it had entered into sponsorship deals with multiple Indian Premier League (IPL) teams and with Star Sports to advertise during the IPL season starting later this month. This is also seen as an attempt by the company to reach out to male users.
Meesho’s plan to have more brands on its platform as well as widen its audience comes at a time when the company has been in talks with several investors for a new funding round. It has, however, yet to finalise the details of the round.
Meesho last raised $570 million in a round led by Fidelity and B Capital in September last year at a valuation of $4.9 billion.
