Last updated: August 29, 2024
I will learn 3 things today in Bangalore.
- What Q-commerce or Quick Commerce is
- The concepts of India 1, India 2, and India 3
- That I do not deserve the hospitality of Indian people
This is Shobhit Bakliwal and he is about to become my Bangalore guardian angel.
He arranges my airport pickup, takes me for breakfast, and gives me a SIM card.
This is too nice. I do not deserve the hospitality of Indian people.
Shobhit is an early adopter.
He had an electric scooter in 2019 and heard about me last year on the My First Million podcast.
We ride on this electric scooter to go to his favorite darshini.
A darshini is like a cafe in South India.
They serve coffee and tea and breakfast and snacks.
He orders us the podi masala thatte idli plus a special masala dosa.
I love the dosa. The crunch, the taste, and the sambar.
We talk about dating – he met his wife on Bumble – and he tells me about one woman in India who had over 67,000 likes on her online dating profile.
I have to try fresh mango! I guess it is in season now.
I learn about Q-commerce, or Quick commerce, and how they’re making a go of it here in India.
Three apps that people use for this are Blinkit and Swiggy (Instamart) and Zepto.
You can get a lot of things delivered here in under 10 minutes.
Then I learn about the idea of India 1, India 2, and India 3.
These are the 3 different levels of wealth and living conditions in India.
It is a broad stroke and I’m sure I will not describe it properly but something like this.
India 1 is the top 2% and they live in major metro areas like Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore, etc.
These people in India 1 are rich, mobile, they watch Netflix and use Twitter and are extremely tech-savvy.
India 2 is the middle class. They’re in major metro areas but also Tier 2 cities like Pune.
This sector has 300 million people and is where India’s growth will come from.
Everyone wants to grow their software, service, products to an India 2 audience.
India 3 is rural India and what I’d consider poor people although some may be happier than us all.
I’m sure I can learn a lot from this group too.
Now Shobhit invites me to his home and we cowork for a bit.
He bought my book The 2-Hour Cocktail Party.
He was maybe the first person in India to host a meetup using my framework.
But Indian people are always late, and it is hard to arrange a meetup in Bangalore on Tuesday nights, and I have to think about how to adapt my formula for different cultural norms.
I meet his wife, we drink some chai, and they offer to let me stay if I ever need a home.
I am not used to such kindness from a reader in a new country.
It feels nice to make a new friend.
THE END
Hi from Nick! Originally published on Twitter / X. I’ve been doing these interviews with people like this one and posting them on my Instagram and Twitter / X. I’ll add some others into the Profiles category. Leave me a comment if you liked this and I’ll try to add some more.