Venture capital firm Tiger Global-backed six-year-old startup plans to scale its retail operations beyond its core markets of Jaipur and Kolkata by investing significantly in building out its supply chain and distribution network in neighbouring cities, Singh said in an interview.
“Our approach for the next few months is to deepen our presence in our strong markets, strengthen supply chains, and densify distribution networks, and move to congruent cities in Rajasthan, West Bengal, and parts of Uttar Pradesh such as Kanpur, Allahabad, and Lucknow,” Singh said.
However, expansion is unlikely to be swift. DealShare is carefully unwinding its B2B operating muscle even as it builds a consumer-facing playbook from scratch, a transition that requires devising region-specific strategies to keep pace with constantly shifting consumer behaviour, according to Singh.
“All regions have different consumption patterns. Take North India, for example. With cities like Gurugram having gated communities, the density of other quick-commerce players is very high. But this isn’t exactly the case with smaller cities like Jaipur and Lucknow, and that’s where the real opportunities are,” Singh added.
New strategy
Over the past two years, DealShare has gone through multiple strategic pivots as it attempted to keep an unsustainable business model afloat. Around mid-2022, it shifted from social commerce to the B2B supply model, before beginning another transition in late-2023 towards a consumer-facing value retail play. The period was marked by repeated layoffs and reduced operations as the company worked to cut costs and stabilize its business.
DealShare has raised nearly $400 million to date from backers including Tiger Global Management, AlphaWave Global, and Unilever Ventures. It was last valued at $1.7 billion in January 2022 following a $45 million extended Series E fundraising from Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA).
The pivots followed the realization that enterprise e-commerce is an inherently challenging proposition to scale, given its narrow margins and credit-heavy nature, according to Singh. “It was clear [by 2023] that B2B is not a model built to scale profitably.”
Singh’s appointment in early 2024 reflects the company’s attempt to lean on seasoned retail leadership. A former CEO of Big Bazaar, he was brought in after DealShare’s co-founders, Vineet Bora and Sankar Bora, stepped down in November 2023 amid restructuring, job cuts, and rising investor scrutiny. The firm’s third co-founder, Sourjyendu Medda, exited in January 2024, marking a decisive break from its founding chapter. The fourth co-founder, Rajat Shikhar, exited the startup in December 2025, according to his profile on the professional networking platform LinkedIn.
DealShare’s B2B model focused on supplying kirana (retail) stores and small retailers with packaged consumer staples through a technology-led procurement and distribution network. Its new business-to-consumer (B2C) model focuses on selectively servicing its private-label and consumer retail operations.
To be sure, India’s quick-commerce market is set to triple in size from an estimated ₹64,000 crore in 2024-25 to around ₹2 trillion by 2027-28, according to a July report by CareEdge Ratings.
New challenges
The pivot, however, places DealShare in a crowded and unforgiving arena. On one end, it now faces the scale and cost discipline of DMart (Avenue Supermarts Ltd), Vishal Mega Mart, and Reliance Retail’s quick-commerce venture JioMart, which are swiftly shortening fulfilment timelines and expanding delivery radius in many urban pockets. On the other hand, it is competing with the speed-led expectations shaped by quick-commerce players such as Blinkit, Zepto, and InstaMart, which are now making inroads in tier-II and tier-III cities.
“This is one of the most crowded phases value retail in India has seen,” said Madhur Singhal, managing partner and CEO at management consulting firm Praxis Global Alliance.
“With organized value players scaling up and quick-commerce platforms blurring the lines between convenience and price, new entrants face shrinking room for error. Differentiation today is less about discounts and more about supply-chain discipline and hyperlocal execution,” Singhal noted.
Moreover, shifting from B2B to a consumer-facing model can be structurally difficult, even though it appears operationally adjacent. “B2B models aggregate relatively predictable demand, whereas B2C models must continuously stimulate consumer demand—resulting in higher customer acquisition costs and greater volatility.”
An ace up its sleeve
DealShare’s consumer pivot is closely tied to the expansion of its private-label portfolio, which the company believes is central to making the economics work.
The firm owns nearly a dozen in-house brands across staples and personal care, allowing it to control pricing, margins, and supply far more tightly than a marketplace-led model would permit. This includes Chemko (home care), Sampoorti (staples), Home First (home and kitchen), and X One (personal care).
“In our strongest markets, we plan to invest more in private labels as well as expand the number of variants in each category. The idea is to provide good-quality products to customers at a reasonable price. We are seeing a very good response to our private brands because the customers that we are serving are value-conscious and aspirational,” DealShare’s Singh said.
Private brands currently account for nearly a fourth of the firm’s revenue. In 2023-24, the firm’s operating revenue plunged 75% year-on-year to ₹500 crore, while it managed to cut losses to ₹167 crore from ₹502 crore a year ago.
The strategy, however, raises execution risks, as private labels demand scale, consistent quality, and sustained consumer trust to compete with entrenched national brands, according to Praxis’s Singhal.
“Our private investments analysis indicates that private labels become meaningfully value-accretive in B2C only after brand-led repeat behaviour stabilizes, rather than at the point of launch,” Singhal said, adding it may take a long time for the difference to show in its results.
However, Singh believes that its assortment of private labels has carved an impact from its B2B days, and has the potential to influence its B2C business. “Pricing strategies can be reworked based on consumption habits, helping us offer better value for premium products and at the same time safeguard our margins.”
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