Degree

Master of Business Administration

Faculty / School

Faculty of Business Administration (FBA)

Advisor

Dr. Saima Hussain, Assistant Professor, Department of Marketing

Committee Member 1

Ms. Saima Hussain, Lecturer Business Administration - Academic Affairs, Institute of Business Administration (IBA), Karachi

Project Type

MBA Research Project

Keywords

https://ir.iba.edu.pk/do/search/?q=e-commerce&start=0&context=8598587&facet=">e-commerce, Infrastructure facilities, Business engagement, Competitive advantage

Abstract / Summary

This project was carried out as an MBA Project to explore the expansion and feasibility of the selling the ice cream through the e-commerce channels in Pakistan and to find the gaps and issues that are presently being faced and will be faced in the future by both the ice cream manufacturers and the e-commerce delivery solutions. This project was split into three parts – the delivery solutions, the grocery e-commerce platforms and Unilever’s own ecommerce portal – Party will Wall’s.

There was no primary research – in the form of qualitative and quantitative tools, as it wasn’t required due to the nature of the project. Rather, we carried out only secondary research – through literature review and operational exploration.

The secondary research highlighted that due to the development of infrastructure facilities across the world, and the rapid adaption of 3G and 4G internet service, the society has notably shifted towards the ecommerce shopping, preferring ease and comfort over traditional brick and mortar shopping. With the advent of smart phones, and new apps developing every few minutes, the market has been expanding tremendously for the last few years. However, due to certain factors, such as electricity breakdowns and space constraints, there is still a restrain on its growth.

Operational exploration was carried out in three separate forms, through the delivery platforms – mainly Foodpanda, grocery ecommerce venture – primarily HumMart, and Wall’s own delivery platform – Party at Walls. The ecommerce of Walls is currently in its initial stages. Several campaigns were carried out to test the online market for ice cream to see if the market was ready to accept ordering it via Foodpanda, whether they are properly equipped to satisfy the demands of the larger target market when this service is marketed on a larger scale and if the products are viable enough to reach the customers in the right condition.

Moreover, in the case of HumMart, currently the distributors are accustomed to traditional modes and method of operations in terms of business engagement with the retailers. For example, in traditional retail, the retailer generates the purchase order, distributor delivers the orders and receive the order payment at the same time. There is no credit period or limit for traditional retailers. On the other hand, e-commerce players are not accustomed to such practices. Currently e-commerce player usually operates on credit period model. They ask for the product from the supplier/vendor, records the product in inventory and the sells it. The payment of the product is done after a certain period of 10- 20 days after receiving the product. Currently the existing distributor are not trained and explained about the dynamics of the e-commerce industry and about how to resolve the issue of credit terms and payments.

Party with Walls is a very creative idea and it would be very beneficial for Walls if they make it operational in major cities of Pakistan. None of the ice cream companies in Pakistan has come up with this idea so Walls can exploit its resources and make use of this platform to push its sales. The unique delivery solution has helped Walls achieve competitive advantage over other companies due to which other ice creams brands have not entered this area yet.

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Available for download on Saturday, December 05, 2026

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