My School Depot was founded to solve a problem which parents and students face every year at the beginning of a new academic session, "Procuring School Supplies". In early 2015 when Vivek Goel, one of the co-founders of My School Depot was trying to procure school supplies for his niece realized that the process is cumbersome and time-consuming and wished there could be a better way. After researching the market for few months and brainstorming with parents, students, schools, and vendors My School Depot was founded by Vivek Goel, Bharat Goel, and Ashish Gupta in September 2015 with the vision to revolutionize the way we buy school books, uniforms, and supplies.
The traditional way of buying school supplies is to visit multiple shops, wait in the queue and if the product is not available then visit the store again at a later time, existing e-commerce solutions do help, but one still needs to search each product and order them one by one. My School Depot solves this by carefully understanding the need for each student and curating the products by grades so parents can purchase what they need in just a single click and get it delivered right to their doorstep. Unlike any other e-commerce portal, every product is carefully vetted and reviewed to make sure each time is relevant and as per school guidelines. My School Depot partners with the uniform, books, stationery vendors, and local delivery partners to ensure the right products gets delivered in time. Every order is subjected to a small commission paid by the seller.
My School Depot started it's operation with a primary focus on Uttrakhand as the test market in March 2016 with 50 schools and over 2000 products onboard. In a short span of two months with targeted marketing, received over 1100 orders and delivered books and uniforms to about 1300 students.
For next session My School Depot is set to open its operations in five more states including Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan with a focus on digital marketing and stick to targeted marketing via creative methods to reach end customer through offline engagement programs and social media.
Indian school supplies is a lucrative market with over 1.46 million K-12 schools and 29.3 million students which are internet savvy and using e-commerce for ordering products online, bringing the serviceable opportunity of over 10,000 crores and continues to grow. Despite the large market size, it is disorganized.
