e-commerce
Tier 3 cities drive Valentine’s e-commerce demand, says Fynd report
Personal care jumps to no 2 category as Sunday shopping peaks
MUMBAI: Fynd has released its Valentine’s Day e-commerce report 2026, highlighting a sharp shift in how Indians shopped during the season of love, with self-gifting, tier 3 demand and trust-led purchasing reshaping online retail behaviour.
The analysis, based on data from major marketplaces including Myntra, Flipkart, Amazon, Tata Cliq, Ajio and Nykaa, shows Valentine’s commerce in 2026 moving away from grand gifting towards personal indulgence and regional expansion.
Tier 3 cities emerged as the strongest demand drivers, accounting for more than 54 per cent of total order volumes, outpacing metros and reinforcing the rapid mainstreaming of digital commerce across Bharat. Sunday proved to be the peak shopping day, signalling leisure-led browsing and last-minute purchasing behaviour rather than weekday-driven sales spikes.
Personal care was the breakout category of the season, climbing to second place with a 14.16 per cent share of orders, overtaking categories such as footwear and ethnic wear. Clothing retained the top spot at 17.06 per cent. Within personal care, Tata Cliq emerged as the preferred marketplace.
The report also points to a notable comeback for cash on delivery. While COD accounted for 55 per cent of overall orders during the Valentine’s period, nearly 70 per cent of personal care purchases used COD, reflecting higher trust thresholds for grooming and intimate categories.
Regionally, overall order volumes were led by north India, followed by west, south and east. Personal care demand, however, skewed differently, with west and east leading consumption. Bihar entered the top five ordering states, underlining the growing spending power of emerging markets.
Fulfilment patterns also diverged from recent omnichannel trends. Store-led fulfilment fell sharply during the Valentine’s window, with just 6.5 per cent of personal care orders dispatched from stores, as brands leaned heavily on warehouse networks to manage speed and inventory control.
Fynd chief business officer – India Ragini Varma, said the data reflects a shift from occasion-led gifting to personal expression-led shopping, requiring category-specific intelligence and real-time inventory orchestration rather than one-size-fits-all festive strategies.
e-commerce
Instamart and Duolingo launch street spell check campaign for Instaprint
Duo the owl fixes signboard typos across cities to showcase instant printing.
MUMBAI: If spelling mistakes had a sworn enemy, it might just be a bright green owl with a printer. Instamart has teamed up with language learning platform Duolingo for a quirky nationwide campaign that turns everyday spelling errors into a public spectacle while promoting its instant printing service, InstaPrint. The playful activation takes aim at the many misspelled shop boards and public signs scattered across Indian streets. From “saloons” that promise haircuts rather than drinks to menus and posters peppered with punctuation mishaps, the campaign sends Duolingo’s mascot Duo on a mission to restore linguistic order.
Armed with Instamart’s instant printing feature, Duo prints corrected versions of the mistakes on the spot and pastes them over the originals. The result is a series of humorous street interventions that have quickly begun circulating on social media.
Photos and videos of the grammar correcting owl have been widely shared online, with amused users reacting to the unexpected spell check patrol. One user joked, “Ab ayega na maza bhidu,” capturing the internet’s delight at the unusual campaign.
Behind the humour lies a practical message. The activation is designed to showcase the capabilities of Instaprint, Instamart’s printing service that allows users to print documents and posters almost instantly.
The company says the feature is meant for everyday needs such as printing resumes, visa documents or last minute posters without the usual scramble to locate a print shop.
Instamart introduced Instaprint in 2025 across select metropolitan cities including Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi. The service allows users to order printed materials directly through the platform, extending the quick commerce model beyond groceries and household essentials.
By combining Duolingo’s famously persistent owl with India’s street level spelling quirks, the campaign taps into the internet’s long running fascination with grammar mistakes while demonstrating a real world use case for instant printing.
After all, in a world full of typos, sometimes what you really need is a quick printer and a very determined language teacher.
