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“What is this life if, full of care, we have no time to stand and stare.” (“Leisure”, by W.H Davies).
Growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, my generation has seen a lot of technological advancements- from black & white TV sets to colour ones, from stationary landline telephones to the cordless ones, from calculators to desktop computers and many more. We used to be quite fascinated and content with these small and gradual changes in every sphere of our routine life. Serendipity would knock when the local grocer would suddenly offer home delivery of a long list of items. We felt happy if pharmaceutical shops or the close- by eateries took orders over landline telephones. We would often find a leaflet placed inside newspapers offering “free” home delivery within a certain radius. We used to be thrilled with little USPs such as these and kept aside a tip for the delivery personnel. If the weather wasn’t too conducive, we thought of shelling out more. Empathy and gratitude seemed commonplace in those simpler days.
As the years have gone by, online ordering of food, confectionery, grocery, apparel, footwear, electronic gadgets and anything that one can think of, has become normal. The Covid 19 pandemic further buttressed the idea of online shopping and home delivery. Reluctant ones like me and the elderly population too had no option but to accept the need of the hour and move with the times.
However, the demand for quick home delivery and that too at the lightning speed of ten minutes leaves me quite bewildered. I am astounded that there should be a need, in the first place, to receive things in such a hurry, from fast food, fruits, vegetables, condiments to baby food! Have the human faculties of anticipating and multitasking become defunct! Are not our requirements for the next couple of days foreseeable? Are we not indulging in instant gratification, all the time and at any hour? Is the present generation so busy that they find this to be the most practical and convenient option? Whatever the reason, for the old-school, it is indeed a cause of concern.
Companies offering these services are commonly referred to as quick commerce, q- commerce or simply q-comm. At some level, they are catering to a need or rather “a want” of ours, a want that disregards introspection and empathy- empathy towards the delivery personnel who are perhaps putting their lives in peril to fulfill our never-ending cravings.
It is common knowledge that these quick online delivery systems are driven by AI and the dark store process. A dark store is an efficient, tech-driven, warehouse-like location. When we place an order, it goes to the nearest dark store which is usually two or three km away. Packers at the store are guided by an app that leads them to the concerned shelf within less than a minute. All items are grouped into zones for fast sorting. The final packed order is placed in a separate section for pick-up by delivery partners. They use technology again to figure out the fastest route to deliver the order.
Although I don’t see q-comm as a real need, its promise of delivery within ten minutes raises deeper questions about what we truly require and at what cost. This high-speed model surely must be taking its toll on employee welfare, putting immense pressure on the staff involved with sorting, packing and delivery. They are expected to process and deliver orders in minutes! During peak demand hours, they are faced with inadequate break or rest time. Concerns have often been raised about the safety of delivery riders whose focus is on speeding even if it is beyond his personal safety or road safety norms.
Very few things are genuinely urgent enough to justify such speed and surely can wait for thirty minutes if not an hour. In fact, in that same span of time, people could simply step out and buy what they need themselves from the local shops. Yet q-comm reshapes habits in ways that go beyond convenience and gradually pulls customers away from neighbourhood stores, pushing small shop owners out of business while replacing them with a model that often relies on underpaid and stressed delivery workers. What is framed as instant gratification thus deepens urban inequality and weakens local economies, redefining “convenience” at the expense of human value.
It is not to say that in the good old days, we did not run out of vanilla essence while baking a cake. A friendly neighbour would come to our rescue with a teaspoon of essence only to receive a full bottle of it, a few days later. Not anymore. We now have delivery partners to help us bake the cake and eat it too.
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.