The ‘Buy Now Pay Later’ (BNPL) trend, which has hitherto been popular in the purchase of smartphones, has found favor with other categories of the EMI economy for purchases of products varying from musical instruments, kitchen equipment and even shirts and dhotis as more and more people stay at home during a pandemic. These insights have emerged during an assessment of BNPL transactions across different merchant categories of Mswipe, a leading provider of BNPL or checkout finance in India. Mswipe said metros cities including Mumbai, Bengaluru and Delhi have seen a growing use of BNPL for hair loss and thinning treatments, indicating continued anxiety levels owing to covid. The average transaction size observed for hair thinning and hair loss treatment was Rs 43,000. The western part of the country is using BNPL to buy musical instruments like guitar and piano, with an average transaction size of Rs 40,000. This has been happening in cities like Pune and Mumbai. Similarly, Mswipe found that cities and towns in the northern part of the country have been using the BNPL facility for buying kitchen equipment like chimneys, cooktops, hobs etc with an average transaction size of Rs 20,000. And uniquely in some of the southern towns, people have even been using the facility for buying shirts and dhotis, Mswipe said. Manish Patel, Founder and CEO, Mswipe said these insights reveal a fundamental shift in the behaviour of consumers both in terms of their lifestyle choices and their financing preferences. The growing EMI economy creates opportunities for small businesses that have not been using checkout finance as an incentive for their customers up until now, he added.
