 "Flavours of ICC Cricket World Cup final on apps: Food and flowers")
As the Men in Blue took on Australia in an intriguing ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup final in Ahmedabad on Sunday, the orders on quick delivery platforms reflected the pulsating mood of the nation.
People couldn’t limit themselves to binging on the obvious junk food that is necessary to survive a nail-biter. Many sought out coconuts and flowers to complete their prayers.
“Someone from Thane just ordered 51 nariyals!!! If it’s for finals, the world cup is coming home for real,” Swiggy posted on X.
The social media platform was abuzz with founders of delivery apps sharing insights on the surge in demand as the evening wore on.
Albinder Dhindsa, founder of hyper-local delivery firm Blinkit, wrote on X: “Seeing an interesting ordering pattern. Order rate drops during an over and then shoots back up during the ads.”
Sharing a graphic, he added, “Note the sharp order rate drop at the time of the toss and the first ball of the match…”
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Dhindsa also posted a graph on the surge in the sale of fan jerseys. “Working with Adidas this World Cup season was a good decision. Love that we could help so many fans watch the World Cup in their team India fan jersey. Especially today for #INDvsAUS,” he said, with the graph pointing to a spike in jersey sales for the big match on Sunday after the semi-final between India and New Zealand.
Dhindsa also revealed that orders for chips always peak on days when India is playing. Posting in the middle of the first innings, he claimed: “Currently on track to hit a new all-time high of chips sales.”
Companies wooed customers with free offers. Grocery delivery platform Zepto offered free ThumsUp on orders over ~299, while Zomato promised that “when India wins the World Cup, 10 random people who like this tweet get free dinner”. “Living up to the startup cliché of burning money by giving away Thums Up for free today. We couldn’t help ourselves,” wrote Aadit Palicha, co-founder and chief executive officer, Zepto.
“Serious hype at Zepto right now. We’ve already delivered over 100,000 cans of ThumsUp for free and the game hasn’t even started,” he posted subsequently on X.
Palicha also drew attention to a unique trend.
“India’s religious side is starting to show! Sales of puja flowers are through the roof today compared to a regular Sunday. We thought it was because of Chhath Puja, but there’s been a major spike since the match started,” he wrote on X around 5 pm.
A Swiggy spokesperson told Business Standard that consumers started ordering early in the evening well before they were in the middle of tense moments.
Pizza and burgers emerged as match-viewing favourites while the biryani, thalis, kachori and kebab became preferred choices as the match intensified, according to Swiggy. “Even classic game-day favourites such as garlic bread, cold beverages, Chinese fried rice, noodles, and North Indian delicacies saw a significant uptick in demand,” the spokesperson said.
“By late evening, orders for food had already surpassed previous records of New Year’s Eve and Diwali in the same time frame by a significant margin.”
Swiggy’s grocery delivery service, Instamart, clocked its highest-ever orders on Sunday, beating previous highs like the India-Pakistan match and Diwali.