Rocking Deals: India’s Leading Player in Rising Market of Unboxed Mobile Phones

India is a growing market for refurbished electronics goods, with a meteoric rise in the demand for unboxed gadgets and IT products from tier II and III Indian cities. With business dynamics changing rapidly, the market of refurbished electronics products like mobile phones, tablets and laptops has lots of untapped potential. Two-third of buyers from small cities and towns are willing to pay upfront while ordering refurbished gadgets, according to a survey by ShopClues. Rocking Deals is one of the leading online players in the Indian market of refurbished and unboxed mobile phones.

Rocking Deals is a leading online store for pre-owned lifestyle and electronics products, founded by Yuvraj Aman Singh. Currently the CEO of Rocking Deals, Yuvraj Aman Singh is from a service-class family with three generations in government service. Doing public or private service to pursue and further this family tradition was never his cup of tea. Since the age of 14, he had nurtured his dream of making it big as an entrepreneur.

How Rocking Deals Came into Existence

A graduate in management and business information systems from London’s Middlesex University, Yuvraj Aman Singh founded Rocking Deals out of his hunger for entrepreneurship and based on his insights into the ecommerce industry of India. During his market studies, he found that India’s young population with disposable income was looking to try different models of mobile phone brands at lesser prices than the actual cost of brand new models.

Rocking Deals was not built in a day like Rome. He started his journey with a franchise of TATA Teleservices to sell CDMA phones in 2005. He developed relationships with mobile brands including Sony Ericsson and started getting deals in the category of refurbished, unboxed customer returns. He also signed a pan-Indian agreement with Flipkart to sell their customer returns. Since then there has been no turning back. Today Rocking Deals has 11 business heads working in retail, trading, ecommerce, service, refurbishment, technology and likes.

The Business Model of Rocking Deals

The USP of Rocking Deals is that it is the safest and most trusted place to buy pre-owned electronics and lifestyle products with comprehensive quality-check process, expert product knowledge and unparalleled customer focus. “Our business model is a life cycle business. What goes around certainly should come around. Unlike others who generally sell and forget, we have a complete different strategy of engaging with our suppliers and selling partners till the very end.  As the whole life cycle of a mobile device is 5 to 6 months in the current scenario, we make sure to provide newer and better products though unboxed, thereby making customers our lifetime partners,” said Yuvraj Aman Singh.

Where Rocking Deals Stands in Competition 

Relationship with suppliers as well as selling partners, smooth transition, fool-proof quality check process, quality products with brand warranty, and unconditional customer support are some of the exclusive keys to Rocking Deals’ strong position in competition with other businesses, according to Yuvraj Aman Singh.

“We prefer buying a whole lot of models of mobile phones from one brand rather than several different brands at a time. We sell to end customers, not wholesalers, though it takes a long time. Our brand image would have been at stake if we had made products available I the wholesale market. We strive to maintain good relationship with individual customers by providing them refurbished mobile phones and other products with proper quality check and within their budgets. We try our best to address their queries about unboxed products so that they can make buying decisions without a second thought. No alternative to hard work. No short cut to success,” shared Yuvraj Aman Singh in no uncertain terms.

Challenges that Rocking Deals Faced

The biggest challenge was to change customers’ biased perception of refurbished and unboxed products. They thought that the products were faulty and repaired with duplicate spares. Yuvraj Aman Singh took up the challenge of selling unboxed phones and other products to those customers by convincing them, “Selling a product at cheaper prices does not mean that the product is faulty.” He made sure that customers got the best. Though it took time, Rocking Deals was finally able to win the trust of customers. “We chased the goat till end by selling customer returns and pre-owned products with brand authenticity and warranty of a long shelf life. We upgrade customers’ phones every six months for minimum charges,” said Yuvraj.

Current Profitability of Rocking Deals

“Rocking Deals commands the market!” That is what Yuvraj said proudly. Currently Rocking Deals sells through Amazon India, Snapdeal, eBay, ShopClues, Quikr, Junglee, Zopper and other ecommerce portals. It sells close to 1500-2000 units a day to end customers. Today Rocking Deals is the largest supplier and seller of unboxed and refurbished electronics products based on its goodwill in the market and words of mouth. As of now, Yuvraj has a team of 250 people and works with 15 agencies that the work is outsourced to.

Future Plans and Goals

Rocking Deals has signed up with the biggest technologies of the world for testing electronics without manual intervention. Yuvraj said that Indian market is huge for the business of refurbished products and the sky is the limit for ecommerce. He is looking to take the Indian market by storm instead of expecting a business of 1000 crores a year by 2020 or 5000 crores by 2025. Currently Rocking Deals sells 50k units a month and expects to take it to 100k units a month by the next financial year.

The Closing Note

“Doing business is not an easy task and that too in India. It requires a lot of planning, hard work and effort. Currently Rocking Deals is one of India’s leading players in the market of unboxed phone and refurbished products. We are looking to be India’s largest player in the same. Needless to say, Rocking Deals has a long way to go. Quality, authenticity and warranty are our commitments,” said Yuvraj Aman Singh.