The more things change, the more they remain the same.
Blinkit will begin sending free dhaniya with vegetable orders after a request from a user’s mother. “Mom got a mini heart attack because she had to pay for dhaniya on Blinkit. Albinder, mom is suggesting that you should bundle it for free with certain amount of veggies,” posted X user Ankit Sawant.
Getting free dhaniya (coriander) along with vegetables is a staple of the traditional Indian shopping experience. While shopping at small vegetable vendors or at roadside stores, people often ask for dhaniya if they’ve made a sufficiently large order, and shopkeepers are only too happy to throw it in for free. This is something that’s true across India from the north to the south, and is an implicitly understood pact between vegetable vendors and shoppers.
As it turned out, Blinkit CEO Albinder Dhindsa saw the X post where the user’s mother had requested that free dhaniya be provided with vegetable orders on Blinkit. He replied with a simple “Will do it” at 6:31 pm.
But it wasn’t just an idle tweet. At 10:48 pm — just 4 hours later — Dhindsa shared a screenshot showing how Blinkit had begun offering 100 gm free dhania with orders. “It’s live,” Dhindsa posted on X. “Everyone please thank Ankit’s mom. We will polish the feature in the next couple of weeks,” he added.
This is a feature that shouldn’t been thought of a lot sooner by Indian grocery firms — dhaniya isn’t worth very much, and is a nice touch to bundle it with e-commerce orders. The free dhaniya would’ve also been a uniquely Indian twist to e-commerce — like Zomato had tried wooing older customers with a veg-only fleet, free dhaniya could’ve helped onboard more senior users to hyperlocal apps by offering an experience that was more familiar to them. Blinkit, though, has acted in 4 hours flat after being prompted about the change, and begun offering free dhaniya to all users. And even though a lot has changed has changed in how we now buy groceries — they come in 10 minutes through dark stores, with order predictions using AI and delivered on electric bikes, it’s reassuring that they still come with a customary bit of free dhaniya.