India’s ecommerce market is entering a new phase where growth is driven less by raw scale and more by intent, speed, and contribution margins. LS Digital’s latest report, “The Great Indian Commerce Shift,” based on over 1.5 million orders across 30+ enterprise brands during the July–December 2025 festive season, shows that the traditional linear funnel has effectively collapsed. In its place, consumers are displaying what the report calls “bipolar buying” behaviour, alternating between instant, low-ticket purchases on quick commerce platforms and planned, premium purchases on marketplaces.
Bipolar Buying: Between ‘Need-It-Now’ and ‘Planned Premium’
The study finds that shoppers are splitting into two distinct decision paths. In the “Need-It-Now” economy, quick commerce has become the default for low-ticket and impulse categories well beyond groceries, including personal care, OTC wellness, gifting, and everyday essentials. For items under ₹500, quick commerce delivered three to five times higher conversion rates than traditional marketplaces, as the consideration window collapses and intent flows directly into purchase.
In parallel, the “Planned Premium” economy is anchored in marketplaces, which continue to dominate high-consideration, higher-ticket categories where trust, reviews, and financing options such as EMIs play a larger role. Purchase journeys are increasingly shaped by urgency, context, and fulfilment promises, rather than the old model of broad, top-of-funnel exposure.
From Volume-Led Growth to Contribution-Led Performance
Festive 2025 marked what LS Digital calls an “efficiency flip.” Marketplace conversion rates improved from 4.4% to 6.1%, while many D2C brands reduced ad spends by 120–180 basis points and still delivered around 55% improvement in ROAS. This shift signals a move away from volume-chasing towards contribution-led growth, where brands optimise for blended CAC, margin, and lifetime value instead of pure reach.
Ad inflation in 2025 was highly category-specific rather than uniform: personal care and home décor saw sharp CPC inflation, while innerwear and household supplies experienced CPC deflation, creating arbitrage opportunities for brands willing to rebalance media portfolios.
Bharat and Speed Redefine the Growth Engine
The report underscores that Tier‑2 and Tier‑3 markets drove 65% of festive orders, cementing Bharat as the primary engine of ecommerce growth. Operationally, fulfilment speed has become a decisive trust and profitability lever. For the first time, 51% of festive orders were fulfilled via stores, overtaking central warehouses, as ship‑from‑store models helped reduce delivery times and logistics costs.
However, delivery timelines beyond three days led to a 140% spike in return‑to‑origin rates, especially for cash-on-delivery orders in non‑metros, eroding margins and emphasising the need for faster, more local fulfilment networks. Brands that cannot compress delivery windows risk losing both trust and unit economics.
Strategy for 2026: Allocate for Platform Personalities, Not Just Channels
LS Digital’s analysis suggests that in 2026, competitive advantage will be defined by how effectively brands convert real-time intent into frictionless commerce while optimising blended CAC and fulfilment speed. The report argues that efficiency gains will not come from simply “bidding smarter,” but from allocating budgets correctly across the funnel and matching creative, offers, and logistics to each platform’s inherent “personality” — quick commerce for high-velocity, low-ticket intent, and marketplaces for considered, premium purchases.
Brands that continue chasing volume without rethinking media and fulfilment models risk hitting an “inflation wall.” Those that design for bipolar buying and speed-first operations are better placed to win in India’s next ecommerce growth phase.
