Buying stuff online? You’re already living in the right country. India’s e-commerce industry has exploded, allowing shoppers to get everything from stupidly large televisions to groceries and bubble top water cans online. Prices are largely competitive, and during times of festive sale, you’re likely to score better deals shopping on Amazon India and Flipkart than their equivalents in the United States, Europe, or even *gasp* China.
If there’s a downside, it’s that of availability. Not everything is available immediately, sellers are very conservative with their stocking, or India somehow skips a generation of products—electronics, for instance. And if you’re the sort who digs fashion (this writer merely knows how to spell the word, admittedly) or are an avid fan of all things trendy, online Indian marketplaces could be entire seasons behind. Yes, whole seasons!
But we have the internet, and world is at our feet. What follows is a list of obvious and not-so-obvious online shopping websites which will put stuff in a box and send it to you from exotic locations—as long you give them your credit card information.
Amazon.com
Let’s get the usual suspects out of the way first. While Amazon.in is fully capable of keeping Indian shoppers happy with its huge catalogue of products, inexpensive Amazon Prime subscription and one-day grocery delivery in some cities, there are going to be some unattainable products. This would be a good time to point out that Amazon.com ships a lot of products overseas (there are restrictions, of course). International shipping and duty charges (based on estimates) are applied at the time of